


The Song Remains The Same

by tarlie



Series: Record Shop AU [1]
Category: Political RPF - UK 20th-21st c.
Genre: A general lack of any sort of work ethic, Gordon Brown's Band Days (implied), It's an AU where they're all millennials and it's full of every concomitant horror you can imagine, Kissing, MANY OTHER BAD THINGS, Margaret Beckett was a punk once you know, Multi, Peter Mandelson uttering the words 'Yas Queen'
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-12
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2018-09-08 05:20:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 31,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8831998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tarlie/pseuds/tarlie
Summary: New Labour, but running a record shop in Islington.





	1. There's Too Much Love

 

Gordon, being Gordon, has only made coffee for one. This is a problem (the coffee, not Gordon– Gordon is never _really_ a problem–) that could be effortlessly solved in any workplace possessed of at least one functional adult. Red’s is no such establishment.

In the absence of anyone willing to fill the role, Tony elects himself as the closest thing available, as Margaret, Harriet and Robin all hover mutinously around the coffeemaker. Apparently, actually making more coffee would constitute an act of surrender to Gordon’s bad habits, a betrayal of their show of unity against Gordon’s tyrannical egotism, and general poor comradeship. None of this means they don’t want coffee, though, and so every morning they wait in silence for Tony to arrive and make a fresh pot, the acting neutral diplomatic body between Gordon and the rest of the shop.

He can’t deny he enjoys it.

 

  
* * *

 

After the first cup of coffee everyone brightens and begins to chatter– Robin’s written a Medium piece on how Suede was the best band of the 90s or something, and Margaret is preoccupied with trying to give the place some appearance of organisation but still mumbles a little about about Pulp. Harriet is quiet, supposedly taking care of the ‘online brand’ (Tony suspects she’s actually just on twitter, but that’s what he does on the digital shift as well).

Gordon is in the office, balancing the books.

Tony is careful to ignore the way his mouth goes dry and his heart races opening the office door. The need to see Gordon, these days– just to check that Gordon is indeed real and a part of his life and not going anywhere– has become almost overwhelming. This is something he files away in his mind under  _stupid fondness_ and maybe _unfortunate consequences of being six months without a date_. Get too lonely for too long and you probably start to consider anything, he’d told Peter once, drunk on Peter’s best Prosecco.

“Hi!” he says, perfectly upbeat.

Gordon barely lifts his head from his papers. The shop’s always been Gordon's darling, of course, but the effort of keeping it afloat seems almost to consume him at the moment. Tony likes it when he can get him away from Red's, let him unwind a little– even just smile, these days.

“Don’t sit in the chair,” Gordon barks suddenly, “those papers are important.” Tony smiles, choosing instead to hover over him, watching Gordon navigating the impossible mess of his own stuff, and the way his chest moves when he breathes.

“How are we, Captain?” he asks softly.

“Not good,” Gordon admits, looking grim.

Tony shrugs. From this distance, in the cramped little office, he could probably end up in Gordon’s lap if he made the wrong move. He shifts slightly.

“You should go talk to the customers sometimes, you know?”  

Gordon finally looks at him, and Tony’s smile brightens just a little.

“Which of us has been here since sixteen, Tony?”

Tony just laughs at that.

“And which of us shouldn’t tell the other how to do their job?” Gordon presses. His tone is gruff, but his eyes betray amusement, and Tony can tell he doesn’t mean it.

“So you get to give me orders?”  He considers the idea for a moment, and ignores the chill it sends down his spine. Stupid thought. “Ours is a very traditional marriage, isn’t it? You mind the money, I talk to the guests–”  

Gordon actually chuckles, and Tony feels a stab of triumph.

“Don’t let Harriet hear you talking like–”

“I won’t. She’s still upset after I said Kate Bush wasn’t actually all that good.”

“I don’t blame her. It was a profoundly wrong thing to say.”

“ _Hounds of Love_ is good. The rest is just... hype.”

“Profoundly wrong on _every level_.”

“ _The Dreaming_ has three good songs at most,” Tony doubles down, but he can barely keep a straight face, and Gordon sounds relaxed, comfortable, the laughter in his voice unfamiliar and welcoming.

“You’re embarrassing yourself now. Go back to praising Robyn as the greatest singer of a generation.”

“Gordon, that was _five years ago_!” he exclaims in exaggerated outrage, but it makes Gordon laugh.

"The internet is written in ink.”

At some point, Tony’s hand has found its way to Gordon’s shoulder. He thinks he could just move it upward– just a little, perhaps– and touch his hair.

“I should get back to the shop,” he says abruptly, and Gordon nods. “Just wanted to check on you.”

“You should check on Margaret. She’s going to catch up with you as best saleswoman one of these days.”

“As if!” Tony scoffs, already out of the door, still beaming fondly.

Margaret and Robin have finished the cleaning, and the store looks less unkempt than usual. It’s still not _good_ – still dark and cramped and fusty, the red paint too garish, the oversized Marx poster in the back a bit weird. It has charm, though, and potential, and all the stuff Gordon talks about when they talk about the future.

“How’s Planet F?” Robin asks, with the usual implicit _that horrible bastard_ Robin always manages to imply when he talks about Gordon.

“You know, it doesn’t work as well if you don’t actually say ‘fuck’, Robin,”  Tony points out amicably. “He’s doing the books, as usual.”

Robin huffs in derision. Margaret sighs.

“I do realise that he’s the only one of us that understands accounts, but it would be nice to actually _have_ the four salespeople John hired me to manage.”

“If you’re hiring someone else,” Harriet muses, “it should be a woman. To create a gender-balanced staff.”

“Sue basically works here, though,”  Tony points out.

"For free," says Harriet, frowning.

“For  _Gordon_ ,” Robin complains, and Margaret shakes her head.

“It doesn’t matter anyway. Planet Fuck tells me that we can’t afford a fifth employee,” she says bitterly, and Tony bites his tongue to stop himself defending Gordon. She shrugs. “Well. Back to work. And before any of you ask, we have a schedule, it’s Tony’s turn to choose the music today, save your complaints.”

She glances at Tony.

“Just promise me it’s not six hours of the Stones.”

“Only three,” he jokes, but she doesn’t laugh.

They never did forgive him for that one time.

 

* * *

 

There’s never much to do this early on, so they wander around checking their phones and arguing about the long-term prospects of Pokémon Go. Robin and Margaret talk about stuff they read in the _Guardian_ , and groan pointedly when the first Stones song ( _She’s A Rainbow_ is, in Tony’s opinion, woefully underappreciated) comes on.

By 11:00, though, customers have begun to trickle in, and Harriet is on the phone, asking Robin about stock, and Margaret is smiling and closing deals, and this is where Tony feels most at home– not mired in a clan of weird and outdated hippies but actually doing something interesting and engaging; when he can talk a customer who who was really only browsing and convince them to take home more than they could possibly want, or when he spots someone who would feel otherwise kind of lost in a place like this and manages to get them to buy records or CDs almost in spite themselves. He knows John likes it too; he’s always been impressed by Tony.

“You and Gordon,” he says, sometimes, “you’ve got it, haven't you?”

Tony always wonders, when John says that, whether he most enjoys the praise or the comparison with Gordon.

 

* * *

 

Margaret finally tells him to take his lunch break, and he pops into the little shop next door to buy sandwiches and two cokes. Gordon, still sequestered in the office, will probably be dealing with the inventory demands by now, and he’ll already be expecting Tony. Hunger is one of the few things that poses any difficulties to the smooth machinations of his ridiculously brilliant brain.

“Good sales?”

“Some,” Tony replies with transparently false modesty. Gordon chuckles.

“Remember when you got that sixty-year-old lady to do the lyrics to _Atomic_?”

“It’s a good song. Everyone should like that song.”

“ _Oh, your hair is beautiful_ ,” Gordon hums, low but loud enough for Tony to hear. Then, endearingly, he blushes a little. “I like it too.”

He brushes a hand through his hair, frowning, and Tony stares at his Coke and devotes all his energy into not thinking about the fact that their knees are touching as _River Deep, Mountain High_ plays over the store’s sound system, and into not thinking about how easy it is, sometimes, to picture Gordon wanting it, as much as he wants it, or thinks he wants because he’s lonely. Whatever.

There’s a knock on the door and Margaret comes in, looking extremely bothered.

“Gordon, Tony,” she says, like she can’t believe this is happening _again_. “They’re back.”

 

* * *

 

Every Monday, like clockwork, they turn up: Jez, Mac and Diane, leafleting in front of their store about their stupid slam poetry event ( _ART! CHANGE! NOW!_ their leaflets scream in white and red. Tony thinks this is bad advertising as much as anything).

And every Monday, like clockwork, they get kicked out by Gordon and Tony, usually after Gordon has screamed at Mac, and Diane has called Tony a fascist, and Jez has whined a bit about how unfair everything is. After this the other two usher Jez away to their ‘secret artistic hideout’ (Tony has never been, but he imagines it to be more or less exactly like their store, but dirtier, less welcoming, and with more Marx-themed memorabilia), presumably to plot the revolution.

“Come and watch _real_ art! Come and see what _truly_ revolutionary art looks like!” Mac is currently screaming at a woman passing by, who looks about to have a heart attack. “Come watch _revolutionary_ art!”

Spotting Gordon and Tony, he stops. “Oh, _great_. Here come the bourgeois establishment.”

“Hi to you too, Mac,” Tony replies pleasantly. “How’s it going with you guys?”

“Not bad,” Jez says, apparently addressing the lamppost next to Tony’s head, “The aubergines in my allotment are doing well, and my cat– ”

Diane cuts him short.

“Don’t, Jez, don’t engage with them.”

Tony hadn’t been aware he had been.

Diane squares up to Tony, who thinks, not for the first time, that she’s really far too smart to be going around with Jez and Mac. “We have a _right_ to be here, and we’re not leaving.”

“Actually, Diane, you don’t have the right to be here, and you are definitely leaving.” Tony explains, still friendly. “You know this, because it happens every Monday.”

“People like us!” Mac roars. “The _public_ want to hear us– ”

“Mac, three likes on your tweet does not actually constitute the public.”

“This is absolute bollocks!” Mac shouts, a couple of inches from Tony’s face. “We have permission from _Mr. B_ to leaflet here! When Mr. B owned this shop…”

“Benn,”  Gordon manages to growl through gritted teeth, “ _despite_ what he might have told you, never actually owned this shop. And he hasn’t worked here in six years.”

“WHEN MR. B OWNED THIS SHOP, HE CARED ABOUT REVOLUTIONARY ART,” Mac screams, attempting to grab Tony by the collar.  “IT WASN’T SOME HIPSTER POSE TO HAVE MARX POSTERS, IT WASN’T– ”

“Back the fuck down,” Gordon interrupts, pushing Mac back. He’s fuming, Tony can tell, but Gordon and Mac always engage in a little macho theatre, so he’s not unduly worried. Jez and Diane exchange glances and appear to decide that this is no time to break a life-long policy of non-interventionism. “You three will get out of the front of my shop.”

“It’s not your shop.” Jez points out, with the weird bluntness that always seems out of place. The words float awkwardly between them, like an unpleasant smoke. Gordon doesn’t seem to know how to respond to that, mostly because it’s true.

Tony sighs.

“Look. Listen. Guys. We do this _every Monday_. Can you please go?”  he asks, in one final plea for civility.

“No,” Mac replies, and shoves another leaflet into a woman’s hand. “COME SEE REAL REVOLUTIONARY ART!”

“I’m calling the fucking police,” Gordon growls, already pulling his phone from his pocket.

“Oh, you’re _calling the police_ on us? Like a _fascist_?” Diane snaps, but she’s already gathering her leaflets and coat to leave. “You know, we used to go to your concerts, Gordon. You wrote _real_ poetry once.”

“I’m currently writing a poem called ‘I Am Calling The Police Right Now If You Three Don’t Stop Scaring My–’” he pauses, checking himself. “ _Our_ customers.”

“Oh, fine, fucking arsehole,” Mac concedes, as he always does. “Let’s go, Jez. Let’s go somewhere our art might be appreciated...”

They move along, doubtless feeling vastly more oppressed than they actually are. Tony doesn’t doubt for a moment that they’ll be back next Monday. Red’s has an uncanny ability to attract weirdos.

“Did you actually used to write poetry?” he asks Gordon, sincerely curious. He’s never managed to get anything about Gordon’s band days from anyone.

Gordon, brushing the hair from his eyes, sulks in silence. Tony drops the subject.

 

* * *

 

In the afternoon, the kids arrive.

Gordon calls them _the kids,_ though they’re all eighteen to twenty-something. Gordon can only be eight or so years older than they are at most, and calling someone that old a kid makes Tony feel ancient. Tony doesn’t much like them, most of them, but they worship Gordon, and when they turn up Gordon emerges from the office to argue about records and offer them advice. That at least is something Tony really does enjoy; the way Gordon speaks to a captive audience, free from the usual shyness and awkwardness. There’s something really ridiculously attractive about it. Tony pretends to be preoccupied with organising the records, instead of with Gordon.

Robin and Margaret don’t like the kids either; Robin because he automatically hates anything Gordon likes, Margaret because they never buy anything, and because they mock customers daring to spend money anything known not to meet with Gordon's approval (a familiar source of distress to Tony. He’s still not sure he’s heard the last of Gordon’s rants after saying he thought Lady Gaga was incredible).

“Is that Bastille, Gordon?” Ed Balls asks, deliberately loud and decidedly derisive as the next song comes on. “How do they even _allow_ that in a record shop?”  
“It’s Tony’s playlist,” Gordon says, amusement lurking at the corners of his mouth. “Be polite, Ed."

Ed snorts in disbelief and Tony wants to ask what exactly is supposed to be wrong with Bastille. He doesn’t, of course. He’s perfectly aware what’s wrong with Bastille. Too pop. Too stupid. Just sad songs for teens who fought with their best friends. Etc., etc.

He really doesn’t like Ed sometimes.

“Can you believe that, Yvette? _Bastille._ ” Ed shakes his head, but Yvette isn’t listening because she’s talking to Harriet, who’s ignoring the phone ringing. “I mean, really.”

“Harriet, the phone,” Tony says, trying to pretend he doesn’t want Ed to shut up. Harriet and Yvette continue to ignore him.

“I bet whoever chose this song hasn’t even heard Suede, right, Yvette?” Ed insists. Tony looks at Gordon, who somehow seems to avoid meeting his eyes.

“Harriet. The phone,” Tony says, a little more forcefully now.

“I mean, it’s got all the depth of a 2010 Liberal Democrat voter, hasn’t it, Yvette?” Ed says. Tony forces himself not to retaliate.

“THE PHONE, HARRIET,” he shouts. A couple of heads turn to his direction, including– mercifully– Harriet’s.

“Sorry,” she says calmly, to him or perhaps to Yvette, and picks up the phone.

Gordon definitely misses his eye this time.

“Gordon, are you going back to the office?” Margaret’s tone is polite but disapproving. “I wanted to ask you about the discounts.”

Gordon nods, suddenly perfectly serious again, and Tony feels a faint embarrassment at causing a scene.

Ed touches Yvette’s wrist and asks whether, since Gordon has to go back to work, they should be going; they leave alongside two others who had been too busy debating if U2 was good in the eighties or not.

Harriet hangs up and sighs in frustration.

“You really didn’t have to do that, Tony,” she complains, looking vaguely dejected.

“Well, John doesn’t pay you to flirt, does he?” Tony says. He’s aiming for friendly; he misses and lands on rude.

“Oh, please. I don’t have to take that from _you_ ,” she snaps. 

“I don’t know what you mean,” he says immediately, annoyed at himself for blushing. 

“You put _Son of a Preacher Man_ in every single one of your playlists,” she tells him with a slightly arch smile.

Tony pretends to be absorbed in shelving copies of Harvest Moon.

 

* * *

 

Peter always comes in just as the store is about to close. He’s usually discreet, too, trying to avoid an accidental run-in with John, but today he practically breaks in, all smiles and wobbling gait.

“I am _very_ drunk!” he announces, cheerfully. “Please put on some Pet Shop Boys, Tony.”

“Is _Domino Dancing_ ok?” Tony asks, laughing as Peter walks unsteadily over to him.

“It’s great.” He bops his head to beat of the song. “We closed a deal with a vodka company. So guess who spent the entire working day drinking vodka?”

“Was it you?” Tony teases.

“It was.” Peter smiles contentedly. “Where are Margaret and darling Gordon?”

“In the office. Talking money.”

Tony doesn’t like the way Peter calls Gordon _darling_ ; he doesn’t think Gordon would let Tony say that. Peter is still talking.

“I come with the gift of good news.”

“That’s a first for you.”

“Oh, Tony,” Peter sighs theatrically. “So _cruel_ behind those beautiful blue eyes.”

“Well, you like that,” Tony says, leaning in. Peter giggles.

“Could anyone resist it?”

The door to the office opens, and Margaret and Gordon come out. Tony straightens, oddly embarrassed that Gordon might have seen their stupid joke-flirting routine. He knows it always makes Gordon uncomfortable (and tells himself that’s meaningless, that Gordon doesn’t like anything related to intimacy anyway. Gordon gets uncomfortable when they talk about Robin’s double act with his girlfriends. But still, he wonders, because everyone wonders. After all, Gordon barely seems to notice when he flirts with customers).

“Oh, hello, Peter,” Margaret says, without much enthusiasm.

“Hello, hello.” Peter visibly attempts, without great success, to seem less drunk. He frowns, concentrating. “Good day, Margaret?”

She shrugs. Behind her, Gordon is frowning. The shop is doing better than before, Tony knows that much, but they got deep into debt a couple years ago and now they’re more or less just surviving. It frustrates Gordon immensely– he talks about setting up other stores, about becoming a properly profitable company, a cultural landmark. Tony thinks maybe if Gordon owned the store, there might be a chance of some of them actually happening. John is still a bit traditional and, Tony suspects, a bit unambitious, satisfied simply to have saved the place from closure.

“Peter brings us good news from the land of advertising,” Tony tells Margaret who collapses, exhausted, into a nearby chair.

“Indeed I do,” Peter proclaims, slurring just a bit as he removes something from his satchel. “There are a _lot_ of opportunities–”

He unfolds a neat red book poster– _The Right Beat For The Party_ , Tony’s favourite biography of Tony Crosland – and smiles wonkily at Gordon and Margaret.

“Book signing. Here. Loads of people.” He numbers each point with his fingers. “...money?”

“That’s brilliant,” Tony enthuses. He’s always loved an opportunity to hobnob. “The store has loads of Crosland records-” Gordon avoids Margaret’s accusing stare- “we could sell them all in one go!”

He can tell Gordon and Margaret are unconvinced. Gordon wouldn’t jump into anything without analyzing it a hundred times over anyway. Margaret just raises an eyebrow.

“What’s the catch, Peter?”

“No catch at all,” Peter replies, far too angelic to be believable. They all stare at him, waiting for the inevitable ‘Well, I suppose’.

Peter sighs.

“Well, I suppose…”

“There you go,” Margaret says, rolling her eyes.

“I _suppose_ ,” Peter continues, heroically ignoring her, “that John wouldn’t like this kind of thing going on the store. And I haven’t told him.”

“Oh, great,” Margaret says, voice dripping with sarcasm. “I’ll just hold a huge event behind my boss’ back, shall I?”

“I don’t see why _not_ ,” Peter complains, a slight whine in his voice.

“Be serious, Peter.”

“Well, what John doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

“I don’t like it,” Gordon interjects for the first time. “I don’t like the idea of doing anything behind John’s back.”

“You’re both being dramatic.” Nobody points out the irony of Peter saying this. It’s too obvious. “It’s for the store.”

“It would bring people in, Gordon,” Tony says, because he knows that gets to Gordon. He can almost see the man’s brain doing the maths. “Prospective customers who might come back later.”

“Thank you, Tony, for being the voice of reason,” Peter says, turning to Gordon, voice silky, softly persuasive and faintly slurred. “Gordon, this is what we’ve always discussed. A really diverse customer base. More sales, more funds, more opportunities. A bigger...” he trails off, waving his arms vaguely. “...perspective?”

Gordon looks wracked with indecision, arms folded, chewing furiously on his bottom lip, a familiar posture that still makes Tony smile. He and Margaret exchange looks; Tony can tell they want this too, that the next few seconds will bring a decision, and this is Tony’s favorite part of anything, really: getting people to say yes.

“Margaret,” Tony says, softly. “What if you ask him to work on the store after closing hour?”

“I’m not going to lie to John.”

“Of course not,” Tony says softly. “But I mean, that’s basically what it is, isn’t it? Overtime?”

“It’s still practically lying,” she protests, but Gordon has unfolded his arms to steeple his fingers, a softening of stance Tony can read like a book.

“If we get permission to do that,” Gordon says– slowly, emphasizing the _if_ – “If we get permission, I  suppose we could just file it under extra time.”

“Gordon,” Margaret says, a slight edge to her voice. Gordon shrugs.

“We could always use more money. More publicity.”

Margaret sighs, defeated, and Tony can taste victory.

“Well, alright.”

“Splendid,” Peter says, rubbing his hands together and smiling. “Margaret, I am too old and too drunk to do a proper _Yas Queen_ , but please know that in my head I am _thinking_ it.”

She shakes her head, still unhappy.

“It’ll be fine,” Tony says, with his most convincing smile. “I’ve never had a bad idea yet.”

There’s a collective eye-roll at that, before Peter asks Tony if he wants to share an Uber.

“Gordon always drives me home,” he replies without thinking.

Peter’s smile holds at least three insinuations at once, and he conveniently fails to ask if Gordon could take him as well.

 

* * *

 

Tony stares out of the car window, and they sit together sit in silence for once after a protracted debate over the merits of _Rubber Soul_ versus _Revolver_ . It’s getting dark, and Gordon next to him is humming absently along to the radio ( _Amy, aka Gladiator_ – Tony thinks Gordon might’ve almost been born to sing Mountain Goats). Tony recognises a familiar confidence growing in his chest, and he smiles up at Gordon as he parks the car in front of Tony's flat.

“Come upstairs,” he invites him. Gordon hesitates, because Gordon always hesitates, and Tony persists. “Come on. I get bored up there alone all evening.”

“And that’s my responsibility now?” he asks, but even Gordon isn’t immune to Tony’s best pleading look.

“Please? I'll make you tea.”

Gordon sighs, and Tony wins his second concession of the night. His pulse creeps up as he thinks about getting a third.

Gordon is familiar enough with Tony’s apartment that he settles immediately on the couch without the half-nervous hovering that characterises Gordon’s visits to the houses of less intimate friends. He doesn’t seem uneasy or thoughtful, either, just tired and rather comfortable. Tony thinks he could stay here forever, in Tony’s ridiculously small apartment, making plans for the store, reading books about socialism, smiling at him as Tony plays the guitar– but he’s already getting ahead of himself, so he sits next to Gordon in the couch, heart hammering more with anticipation than fear.

“You can smoke if you want, Tony,” Gordon says, smiling tiredly but Tony shrugs it off.

“I’ve been trying to quit anyway.”

“That’s good,” Gordon says, approvingly, missing the way that Tony’s arm slides behind his shoulders. “You shouldn’t have started in the first place, you know.”

“I know.”

“Charlie’s the same.”

“I know.” He feels himself falter at the unpleasant mention of Charlie; the rational part of his brain tells him to stop and think, analyse the situation properly. He dismisses it. “Gordon–”

He doesn’t plan an end to the sentence, simply leans in when Gordon turns to look at him, tries to find a proper angle for what is turning out to be a strange kiss already; Gordon isn’t quite pushing him away, but he’s not responding either, and suddenly it’s sickeningly clear to Tony that this has been a mistake of amazing proportions.

He moves away, breathless and flushed and frozen with horror.

“God,” he moans, not quite in the way he’d been planning to a few moments previously. Gordon is suddenly stiffly uncomfortable, staring back at him as though he’s never seen him before. “God, sorry. Sorry, Gordon, I don’t know why I did that,” he lies, heart sinking fast, “I thought it’d be funny– I’m sorry–”

Gordon is on his feet, expression blank with shock. He doesn’t look angry, though, Tony reassures himself.

“We don’t have to talk about this,” he says, words coming out fast and nervous now. “It was stupid, I’m sorry, I don’t know why–”

“Tony–” Gordon says, finally.

“Tomorrow everything is just the same as it ever was, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry–”

“You don’t have to apologise,” Gordon tells him. Tony chokes back another bout of apologies and excuses, and sits in silence for a moment, trying to digest the meaning of _you don’t have to apologise_.

“Oh,” he ends up saying, stupidly, because _please explain_ feels presumptuous.

“I have to go,” Gordon says, staring furiously at the floor.

“Of course.”

Tony can think of nothing he wants less than to let Gordon go right now, at least until Tony can pry some explanation from him. He can’t live peacefully with that half-formed hope still burning.

“I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Tony opens the door for him, and then Gordon is looking at him in that piercing Gordonish way that makes Tony feel terrifyingly powerless and taken in.

“You’re a good friend, Tony,” Gordon says softly, and for a moment Tony thinks, wildly, that he might be about to say something else. Gordon frowns, nods as though to a stranger, and leaves.

Tony doesn’t sleep at all that night, mind fretting at edge of a feeling he has no idea how to name.

 


	2. Ever Fallen In Love With Someone

 

Everything feels somehow askew when he finally gives up on pretending to sleep and dresses for work. He tells himself it’s just exhaustion. His mind, though, keeps rerunning the events of the previous night, colouring them with new interpretations ( _you don’t have to apologise_ , in Tony’s mind, shifts into _I wanted this too_ , into _I am a nice straight man rejecting my needy bisexual friend_ , into _I am saying something kind that will let me get the fuck away from you_ and back again), and he almost gets off the bus at the wrong stop.

The first omen that there is something seriously wrong, really, is the fresh pot of coffee that greets him when he stumbles blearily into the shop.

“Did Sue come today?” Tony asks, because although Sue makes coffee sometimes, she’s never been in on a Thursday before, due to also having an actual  _job_.

“No,” Harriet replies absently, drinking her coffee.

“Did… did Gordon make coffee? For everyone?”

“I made the coffee,” Harriet replies, still not looking terribly interested. “Gordon didn’t come in today.”

It hits him hard, the idea of Gordon being absent from his natural habitat, the idea that Gordon might hate him so much that he would prefer not to go to work. The shop is playing  _Bizarre Love Triangle_ , which must surely be Robin’s idea of a joke. He asks the question anyway, even though he knows the response.

“Do you know where he is?”

Harriet looks at him, shrugging.

“If he’s not with you, he’s probably with Peter, right?”

He wants to scream but instead his face does what it’s used to doing best, and he produces a winning smile.

“Well, he’s certainly not with me,” he says, as lightly as he can convincingly manage.

He sends Peter a text, then another. No reply. Gordon never answers anything right away, and he can’t bring himself to call him.

Margaret is in the office, trying to make sense of Gordon’s papers, and doesn’t have much time for Tony’s question about Gordon’s whereabouts, though she tries to be nice about it.

“Maybe he's finally taking sick leave?”

“Gordon would just come in sick,” Tony points out, and Margaret has no answer for him. He tells her he’s going to do some cleaning.

Robin is in a good mood, whistling along to the tune as he gets behind the counter to read Buzzfeed articles on the store’s computer. Tony decides that maybe it’s worth a shot to ask.

 “I don’t know where Gordon is and if I knew I’d immediately forget, because I don’t care about Gordon,” he says, before Tony can even open his mouth.

“Right,” Tony agrees, defeated.

He tries to help Harriet with the cleaning, tries to look upbeat, but it’s as though he’s forgotten how to act normally– as though someone had screamed at him to act naturally and he’d proceeded to fold himself into an array of weird positions. He texts Peter again. Still nothing. 

He wonders if he’s managed disgust Gordon so much that he’s literally left London. That would be quite a feat, he thinks, actually getting a boy to _Gone Girl_ himself.

“It ok if I go smoke?” he asks Harriet, and she shrugs and mutters assent. The shop is almost empty anyway.

He smokes a cigarette, cold and miserable and thinking about Gordon, and then irritated that he’s thinking about Gordon at all. He gives Peter a call. It goes to voicemail.

Maybe Peter’s decided to join Gordon, he thinks, and they’re together in Edinburgh or wherever the fuck, sipping champagne in a bathtub and laughing at him. Then he tells himself to get a grip, stamping firmly on the smoking cigarette.

When he gets back to the shop, there’s a CLOSED sign on the door. 

“What the fuck?” he mutters to himself, genuinely surprised. Margaret would never let them pull this sort of thing. He doubts Robin or Harriet would even try anyway. He decides to bang on the door, and attracts wary looks from people in the street. “Guys, I was only gone five minutes– what the _fuck_ …”

He keeps knocking until the door opens. Margaret stands in front of him, looking pale.

“Come in,” she says, voice trembling. It's not just her voice; when he steps inside, she struggles to close the door again with shaking hands.

The store is completely empty now, except for Harriet and Robin, wearing matching looks of distress.

“Margaret,” Tony says, with a calm he doesn’t feel at all. “What’s happened?”

“Gordon called,” she says, and swallows hard. “John’s dead.”

The whole store falls eerily silent and Tony swears that he can feel the foundations of the place, like tectonic plates, shifting under their feet.

 

* * *

 

Tony liked John, who’d stopped being ‘Mr. Smith’ about five minutes (and two pints) after they’d first met. Neil had given Tony the job at the store, and John would sometimes chat with him (generally in the pub) about his plans and ambitions. He was almost always kind, even when Tony was obviously out of depth, and unlike the rest of the store had never pointed out that Tony’s strategy of smoking to deepen his voice wouldn’t work and would leave Tony with a very bad habit. John had been generous with his praise– though Tony never knew enough about Scottish music scene for John’s taste– and Tony had never met praise he didn’t want. After Neil retired, John had bought the shop and wasn’t around as often, but they still went out for a beer (several, in truth) with Gordon and the others once a year, and Tony always left feeling like he got it right.

It was Gordon that John adored, though, and Tony had never thought to compete with that. John would shower Gordon with fatherly pride, and then demand twice as much from him as anybody else. Gordon, with his masochistic ambition and unfaltering dedication to the shop, had relished both with typical Gordonish intensity.

In a way– and he was perfectly aware of how stupid it was– Tony knew he’d courted John’s praise because it had felt like winning the in-laws’ approval.

And he’s never been good with death, dealing with death– not at his mother’s funeral, when he’d still been at Oxford, or when his father had got so ill nobody had been certain that he wouldn’t– well. He had thought, even at that age, that the whole painful process was messy and without answers. He’s still fairly sure that it’s impossible to chart a fixed course through it. He does know, though, that he ought to go and see Gordon, so he locates his card and gets the bus over to Gordon's flat.

 

* * *

 

Peter and Philip are already expecting him.

“Hey,” he says, voice gentle; Philip and Peter acknowledge him with sombre smiles. “Margaret told me you've been talking to John’s family?”

Peter nods.

“Gordon's been dealing with everything for them, basically,” Peter explains. “You know what Gordon’s like.”

“Yeah.” He wonders if he should just go into Gordon’s room and talk to him, though he’s not quite sure what his role ought to be right now. Maybe he could use the opportunity to go back to just being Gordon’s friend, to erase what he’s almost sure was a mistake the other night. He wonders, briefly, if that's a bit unfeeling. “Do you guys need me to do anything?”

Philip shakes his head.

“I think most things have been dealt with. Except that, you know...”

“John is still dead,” Tony finishes. The words sound harsh, even to him.

“Yeah, well,” Philip says, tiredly. Tony knows neither Peter nor Philip liked John a lot – they’d both been fired in the takeover from Neil, John declaring their work tasteless and a waste of money, and though they’d both done just fine for themselves since, they'd loved the store and resented their exile. “I don’t know how to tell Gordon that he's not going to be able to solve that one.”

“Is he ok?” Tony asks. It feels extremely glib.

Peter pinches the bridge of his nose, and then rubs his eyes.

“It’s been... a lot to deal with,” he says, finally.

“Yeah.”

He settles on the couch between them, and tries to come to terms with the emotional whiplash of the last twenty-four hours. Vague, half-formed thoughts float through his head; about Gordon, the store, John, talking with John, drinking with John, the strangeness of knowing he’ll never see John again. It all still feels strangely unreal, a future suspended in the air that he can't yet see unfolding.

“Tony.”

Gordon’s gruff voice calls him back, and he opens his eyes. Gordon looks more washed-out than Tony has ever seen him before.

“Hi.” He wonders what the protocol is, here. He doesn’t dare to touch him without express permission in the current circumstances. “I’m... I’m so sorry.” It seems a safe, generic enough thing to say, he thinks.

Gordon shakes his head.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he says, crumpling into the chair next to them.

Tony nods. They spend some time in silence, the four of them. It feels almost like the world is realigning, everything as it ever was, but not even Tony has that much talent for self-deception.

 

***

 

Margaret arrives first thing in the morning to take him to John’s funeral, and she stops when she sees him, blinking.

“Are you going like this?” she asks, pointing at his skinny tie, a little incredulous.

“I don’t own regular ties,” he says, trying to move toward her car anyway.

“Well, you can't go looking like a fucking Beatle!” she rails, and then calms herself down. “Sorry.”

“It’s alright.”

“It’s not really about you.”

“I’m not quite _that_ self-centered,” he jokes, politely. She offers him a rather weak smile.

“It’s so weird that he’s gone," she says, eyes a little teary. "I’ve known him forever, you know. Since my stupid punk days.” He’s not sure if he should say something to that, so they just stand silently until she shrugs and walks to her car.

Harriet is inside, fidgeting with the glove compartment.

“Why are you wearing a skinny tie?” she asks, immediately. Tony is starting to regret throwing away his one good tie when he graduated.

“It’s alright. Just ask Robin to bring a decent one when we pick him up,” Margaret says, starting up the car.

“Robin actually just texted me to say he doesn’t own a tie,” Harriet says.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she curses. “Do you two realise you’re both in your late twenties?”

“I’m only twenty-six,” Tony protests. “That’s mid-twenties, surely.”

“Tony, shut up,” she says.

Tony does.

 

* * *

 

It takes some texting, but they finally hit on a solution: Peter has spare ties, and is utterly unsurprised to discover that they need to borrow two, since Gordon has apparently also had to borrow one. They meet in the churchyard, Peter wearing an expression of perfectly solemn grief Tony can barely tell from the real thing.

“There you go,” he says, centring the knot meticulously and brushing the tie flat. “You’re easier to keep straight than Gordon, actually.”

“Peter, are you going to help me with this?” Robin asks, fighting a losing battle with his own tie.

“No,” Peter replies curtly.

Robin does his best.

 

* * *

 

The service is slow and solemn and Tony finds it all very Scottish. There are people here he doesn’t quite know, John’s family and John’s friends, and he feels like the they stand out in the older, Scottish crowd, a ragtag bunch of unkempt young musical types amongst people who very conspicuously aren't. Gordon seems to fit right in, though; he says a few words about John, sentimental stuff about how John had helped him when he’d been sixteen and new to London, how he’d admired John’s serenity and his seriousness, how he’d been a constant mentor to him. Tony isn’t sure if anyone else could have matched it, Gordon at his best. It only occurs to him later how hard it must’ve been for Gordon to talk so publicly about his feelings.

They go to John’s house afterwards and find everybody sharing stories and drinking. Laughter, creeping in oddly at the outskirts of the room, begins to fill the place; one of John’s girls put on the Patsy Cline he used to sing for them. _I’ve Loved and Lost Again_. Tony always found it funny how these things came about; the sudden shifts of mood, grief melting into memory and the sadness dissipating. He and Margaret start reminiscing, odd facts and funny encounters, and when Robin and Harriet join in they’re suddenly all laughing. This part he finds, to his relief, he can do very well.

Philip, who had largely been hiding behind Peter and avoiding talking to anyone else, asks him quietly for a word, so Tony apologises to the others and they go to John’s kitchen. The kitchen that used to be John’s. He doesn’t quite know how to word it yet.

“They want you to be there,” Philip tells him gently. Tony blinks in confusion.

“Who wants me to be where?”

“Hm, John’s family. They asked you to be there for the reading of John’s will.”

“Fucking hell,” he says. Someone dour and Scottish shoots him a scandalised look, and he offers his best apologetic smile. “Any idea why?”

“I think he might have left you some stuff.”

“What, like a guitar or something?” Tony asks, still confused.

Philip shrugs.

“Will Gordon be there?” Tony asks, like a stupid child wanting a security blanket.

“Yes, of course.” Tony almost sighs in relief, even though he knows he can’t get in trouble with the ghost of John or whatever.

“Everything will be fine, then,” Tony says, more to himself than to Philip.

“I wouldn’t go that far,” Philip replies with a small smile.

Around them, people continue to talk, to cry, and to laugh.

 

* * *

 

The next day brings him more dysfunction, in the form of Jez. He stands in front of the counter, looking as lost as ever and clutching a jar like a lifeline. Tony is surprised that he can even find his way to the shop without Mac and Diane.

“Mate, this is... really not a good time,” Tony says, a little impatient.

“I am sorry for your loss,” Jez says bluntly, as bizarre in sympathy as he is in everything else. “Mr. B told us.”

“Oh,” Tony says, floored. He wonders if Mac is about to emerge from the shadows to start a screaming match. “Thank you, Jez.”

“Diane and I want you to know we get it, really.”

“That’s sweet,” Tony says, because it really is, compared to being called a corporate sellout fascist monster.

“When Hugo Chavez died we were absolutely torn up about it. It really hit us hard.”

Tony isn’t sure whether this is a joke or not.

“Hm,” he hums, rather than risk breaking the ceasefire.

“I made jam,” Jez says, shoving a poorly-sealed jam-jar into Tony’s hands. “For the store.”

“Thank you, Jez,” Tony manages, trying not to stare at the jar in suspicion. “That’s extremely kind of you. And Diane.”

“Blackberry is a good fruit for sadness,” Jez replies cryptically. He hovers awkwardly next to Tony, possibly waiting for Tony to ask for an explanation; after a moment’s silence, he pats him in the back gingerly.

“It will improve, though. You won’t be sad forever.”

Tony doesn’t know what to say, still wordless with the sheer weirdness of it. After a while, Jez stops and looks at him as though contemplating a hug, and Tony thinks he might actually scream if that happens. God is good, though, and Jez just nods stiffly and ambles from the shop.

 

* * *

 

Gordon is talking about the reading of the will, though Tony isn’t listening. His forehead is against the car window, which is fogging from his breath, and he’s getting lost in the melody of the song ( _Hast Thou Considered The Tetrapod_. Gordon really is on a Mountain Goats kick lately). Tony isn’t listening, because all he can really think of is how Gordon, polite greetings aside, hasn’t talked to him. Not properly talked to him. Not the way he used to. Tony isn’t listening because even now the strangeness of the kiss hasn’t faded, and it makes Tony overly aware of every potential interaction, concerned that Gordon interpret it as another seduction attempt. It makes Tony second guess every one of his words, dissecting them until he’s sure there are no double meanings left. This kind of self-doubt is a stranger to him and an unwelcome one; he feels unsettled in his own body as they make the short journey to the lawyer’s office.

“And Prescott is John’s associated.” Gordon pauses before correcting his tenses. “Was John’s associated. He owns around a fifth of the store– I think some share of the studio–”

“Hm,” Tony says, because that can’t be read as anything other than noise.

“You’re not listening,” Gordon says, a shade of annoyance colouring his voice. Tony straightens himself and stares at the road ahead instead of the passing pavement.

“I am.”

“You’re doing your car window look,” Gordon points out, shaking his head. He still sounds exasperated. Tony wants to believe that there’s some fondness there as well.

“What car window look?”

“When you’ve already decided you don’t care but you don’t want to say anything.”

“I don’t do that.”

“You do it _constantly_.”

“Never have,” Tony says, because he can’t help himself. He ought to be above this really, but he loves this, the familiar rhythms of a conversation with Gordon – like a song in itself, something he can follow along with his body, keeping the pace with his feet, my turn, yours, like a well-mixed beat.

“You do it so often it has a _name_ ,” Gordon mutters.

He stays silent for a minute, focusing on parking. Tony wishes he'd let Tony drive for once, stop pushing himself with the eyesight problems and just let Tony take care of stuff. Tony knows he loves Gordon, because he thinks of Gordon as much as he thinks of himself, but it’s a funny, shifting sort of love: he loves him as a friend and as a unruly child in need of dedicated care and as a master he want to impress and in several hundred other ways as well.

He wonders, for a moment, if that’s unhealthy. It’s certainly a bit strange.

They don’t get out of the car right away, Gordon unsuccessfully attempting rearrange his hair into something more acceptable, Tony staring at him from the corner of his eye and trying not to be too obvious about it.

“Tony,” he says suddenly, turning to look at Tony, deep and gravitational, and Tony can’t help but blush. “I think John might’ve left me the store.”

Tony blinks, unsure of what to say next. He's considered that; it had almost seemed unavoidable to him, really, that if the store was to go to any of them it would be to Gordon, who loved it; who had worked for it harder than anyone else. It feels symmetrical and inevitable and fair, and he could see why John would've wanted Gordon to have it, even as he knows that Gordon lacks the bravery and the charm to turn the store into what Gordon wants the store to be.

“If that does happen, I want you–” he begins, and pauses, and Tony knows he’s parsing the sentence, his chest stirring at the possible meanings in Gordon’s words. “I want you to be manager.”  
“Absolutely,” Tony says, before he can even think about it, because there is no set of circumstances where he would say no to proximity to Gordon.

Gordon smiles, genuine and soft, and looks at him through his eyelashes, like some sort of fucking damsel in distress. Tony wants to kiss him again, right now, but he resists the impulse.

“That’s good,” Gordon says, then frets with his hair again, and Tony finds himself leaning in almost without meaning to. There’s another silence. “We should– we should talk about the other night, as well. When this is over.”

Tony nod, unsure of what else to say, but Gordon seems satisfied, opening the car door to leave. Tony exhales, and hopes he doesn’t look as flushed as he feels.

Inside, John’s family are sat in sombre rows, with two empty seats next to a big guy Tony assumes to be Prescott. He says his hellos and settles next to Gordon. It’s strange, hearing John’s stuff being divided up– the studio to his wife and children, the house following suit, some of the instruments off to Prescott.

Tony can tell, even without looking, that Gordon is nervous about the shop; so much of his life has been channelled into keeping it afloat, making the place a success that he’s become bound to it, tied to its history, and– though they both know there’s really nobody else for it– there’s an unsettling sense that it might just vanish in the air now they’re so near it. Tony drums his fingers against his thigh, itching to hold Gordon’s hand, but it still feels intrusive when Gordon hasn’t settled definitions and terms the way he so likes to do. Tony holds his own hands instead, cold fingers laced together as though praying.

“To Gordon Brown,” the lawyer says, and Gordon shifts in his chair. “The sum of fifteen thousand pounds, to be used as he sees fit, with the provision that half goes to paying the outstanding debts of the record shop ‘Red Flag Records’, hereafter referred to as ‘Red’s'.”

Gordon frowns and licks his lips in confusion, barely seeming to notice that he’s made more money in the last ten seconds than he had in the previous ten months. He looks from Prescott to John’s family and back to the solicitor. Tony knows, just as he knows his own name, that Gordon is too smart not to have performed the same calculation as Tony's just done, and suddenly he feels himself struck by a awe inspiring electricity, something that makes his fingers tingle and his heart race, like he’s on the edge of getting the biggest and most important yes, not from Gordon, not from John, but from the universe itself.

“Last but not least,” says the solicitor, and Tony realises he wants the next words the way he'd wanted his first guitar, his first kiss, the first girl he'd slept with, like he wants applause and celebrity, like he'd wanted Gordon the night in his apartment– “the issue of my majority share ownership of Red’s: I entrust it entirely and without hesitation to Anthony Charles Lynton Blair.”


	3. Bad Blood

 

Gordon storms out immediately without a word to John’s family, disappointment making him act like a worse man than he is. Tony stands alone, riffling through his pockets for change for the bus and feeling oddly traumatised, until Prescott takes pity on him and offers him a lift. Tony, too numb to be grateful, trails after him in silence.

“So,” his unlikely saviour says. “You and John. You were friends?”

“I guess,” Tony says. His hands, he notices, are shaking. Adrenaline. He takes a breath, trying to get a grip, and smiles sympathetically. “He was my boss. I liked him a lot.”

“And why did he leave you the store?” Prescott asks, with unfiltered curiosity. Tony blinks, still trying to reconcile himself to it. Prescott frowns. “I thought it would be Gordon.” Tony doesn’t know what to say to that, and stays quiet. “He loved Gordon. Didn’t he?”

Tony shrugs.

“I think he just saw something in me,” he offers, and Prescott laughs.

“Gordon probably thought it would be him too, right?” he jokes, and Tony’s stomach churns with something unfamiliar. Guilt, perhaps.

He reaches out to his phone and types, _Please call me_. He deletes it, pauses, and writes instead, _Please don’t do that thing where you sulk and give me the cold shoulder_. He takes another moment before rewriting that, too; _This is hardly my fault, is it?_

Then he writes, _I love you, I’m sorry._ But it feels as much the wrong thing to say as any of the others, so he erases the words letter by letter.

“You and Gordon,” Prescott says slowly. “You two together?”

Tony usually has a good ear for distinguishing curiosity from crass homophobia, but he can’t tell right now, and even if he could he can’t answer properly because Gordon never labeled them and now Gordon isn’t even his friend anymore. “I’m just asking,” the man continues, “Because John mentioned a Tony, of Gordon-and-Tony fame. But I thought you were Gordon’s partner.”

“Only in the sense that we work in the store together,” Tony says, still ever so polite.

He writes, _I know you’re upset. I want to talk._

He writes, _It doesn’t have to be a big deal_.

He writes _Please_ endlessly, until the screen is weirdly blurry and he realises eyes are damp. The pressure of the last few days, he supposes. He blinks his eyes dry and exhales, running a hand through his hair, and if Prescott notices anything, he doesn’t mention it.

When the car pulls over, Tony thanks him, and Prescott gives him an appraising look.

“Well. Suppose we’re associates now,” he laughs, and for an odd moment, Tony thinks he might be about to get his hair ruffled. “You look like you just got caught committing a crime, kid.”

Tony shrugs, hands in his pockets.

“That’s just what business is, I suppose.”

It's a joke, but it doesn't sound like one. The air is cold when he walks back home, Gordon’s silence burning a hole in his pocket.

He still can’t bring himself to say he’s sorry.

 

* * *

 

It takes what seems forever for his phone to ring; when it does, it’s not Gordon on the other end, but Peter.

“I heard,” he says without preamble, comically serious.

“From Gordon?” Tony asks cautiously, trying to calculate whether Peter will be hostile or supportive, and how he can guarantee Peter will take his side. (Which is crazy, because there shouldn’t be dividing lines between him and Gordon, and yet–)

“Yes.”          

Tony thinks about attack lines and arguments, but hesitates, waiting for Peter to show his hand, the words fretting at the tip of his tongue.

“He thinks you should give him the shop,” Peter says, at last.  Tony’s heart deflates a little. It’s not that he's already decided, as such, not to give Gordon the shop. It’s that he doesn’t _want_ to.

“He said that to you?” Tony asks.

“Yes,” Peter replies, voice impassive. 

Tony exhales and bites the bullet. He can’t out-sphynx Peter.

“I don’t want to do that,” he says, a little sadder than he’d meant to.

“I didn't think you would,” Peter says, and sighs. “And I told him,” he adds, quietly, “that you don’t have to.”

“Oh,” Tony says, and then, “ _oh_.”

 Peter, he realises, has chosen his side.

“How did he take that?”

“Oh, you know how Gordon takes disappointment,” Peter says, flippant. “He was deeply grateful and thanked me for my advice.”

“He called you a traitor and told you to fuck off, then?”

“Oh yes, that's what I meant.” Peter sounds tired, but Tony is all but certain of his loyalty. “I think I might be _persona non-grata_ for a while on Planet Fuck.”

“Sorry,” Tony says, as sincerely as he can in his relief at having managed to get Peter in the divorce. This, he thinks, was a good battle to win.

“It’s fine,” Peter assures him. “But this is a bloody mess.”

“Yeah.”

“You should try to talk to him now,” Peter counsels, with the knowing expertise of years of handling Gordon. “He talked to Philip an hour ago and Philip told him to talk to you.”

“That’s good.” Tony counts another victory, without nurturing much hope that it'll make a difference. He knows Gordon, after all.

“It is,” Peter agrees, sounding a little less fractious. “More importantly, I think it might actually have helped.”

“I’ll text him,” Tony says, and then, like a man suddenly realising he's forgotten his wallet, adds in a rush, “thank you, Peter. I really appreciate it.”

“Yeah, well, be good to the store.” Peter pauses, considering for a moment. “Be good to Gordon, as well.”

He hangs up. Tony feels hollow and strangely victorious, the instruction to be kind to Gordon sitting uncomfortably with him. Kind to Gordon is all he’s ever been.

He lights a cigarette and writes _I think we should talk._ His fingers move to add  _Please just let me see you,_ but he feels like that’s desperate, a bit weak, and he realises he doesn’t want Gordon to see him weak with all this going on.

Ash gathers in a small mound in the ashtray, and he gets no reply. Courtney Taylor-Taylor sings _I haven't thought of you lately at all_ , and he feels impatient, stupid. He lights another cigarette.

Then his phone pings with Gordon’s reply–

_Alright._

–and he smiles, despite himself, with a sudden ridiculous hope that this might soon be over. 

 _Starbucks, at 3? The one I like. On Upper Street._  

There’s another pause, and the Dandy Wahorls sing for the length of the opening to _Veronica Mars_ before his phone pings again.

_I don’t see why not._

Tony thinks about writing _Don’t be mad forever_ or _I’ll make this right, you’ll see,_ but the phone says Gordon’s already offline, and it might just be exhaustion lending plausibility to a bad idea. He wants Gordon, he knows, just as he wants the shop, wants Gordon’s plans for the shop to be realised just as much as he wants to be the one to realise them. He wants everything, and with a talent for desire that can only have been put there by God, he thinks he might just make this balancing act work and come out on the other side with all of it.

 

* * *

 

He finds himself reciting the _Our Father_ in his head all the way to Starbucks. His assures himself it’s still Gordon and he still loves him, but he’s seen Gordon angry before– mostly at other people– and he knows he needs all the help he can get.

He orders Gordon’s espresso for him, as he always does, and he smiles at the barista he knows, making small talk and fiddling nervously with the plastic spoons and wooden stirrers. He takes his favourite table, too consumed with nerves to even touch his own Mocha Cookie Crumble frappuccino, mentally rehearsing opening lines and ways to lead the conversation.

When Gordon arrives, he isn’t alone; Ed Balls trails behind him, face set and braced for battle. The good news, Tony supposes, is that Gordon is here at all, so he tries not to let his smile falter as Gordon sits down, staring at the espresso as though suspecting him of having poisoned it. Ed remains standing, hovering protectively over Gordon’s shoulder.          

“Hey, Ed,” Tony says, for all the world as though he's pleased to see him. “D'you want to order something?”

Ed’s eyes dart to Gordon’s face; Tony recognises the look of someone trying to read his expression for a correct answer.          

“Ed was just on his way out anyway,” Gordon answers for him.

“You can stay if you like,” Tony offers politely, desperately wanting Ed gone.

“I’ve got to go see Yvette.”

It’s transparently a lie, but it does free them from each other.

He’s left alone with Gordon, and he feels absolutely calm. This, he thinks, is just like anything that might harm people you love; it has to be done swiftly and without hesitation.

“I’m keeping the shop,” he says, voice pleasant and steady. 

He pretends not to notice the way Gordon winces.

“You don’t know anything about the place.” Gordon says, staring at the coffee growing steadily colder in front of him. “Nothing that I haven’t taught you.”

It hurts a little more than he expects to realise that Gordon has only ever seen him as a charming idiot, desperate to impress. He tries not to let it show.          

“That’s not actually true,” he replies, a bit sharply. “I’m the best salesman we have.”

“There’s more to it than flirting with customers.”

“Clearly John didn’t think so,” Tony shoots back, fast and to the point. He realises he’s tense, and leans back, steadying his voice. “You used to think I was good enough at what I do.”

.“You used to think I should be the one to own the store,” Gordon replies, surly as a child

“I still want you there!” Tony protests, and he reaches for Gordon’s hand almost involuntarily. He stops himself. “I want you there,” he repeats. “You’d be free to run the finances any way you liked. We could be a partnership of sorts. I just–"

“You just want to make sure you have the upper hand.”

“It’s not a war, Gordon,” Tony points out gently, although he knows that Gordon’s mind doesn’t really work like that.

“I do know what this is really about, you know,” Gordon says, and there’s a bitterness in his voice Tony’s never heard before. It throws him off guard. “I do actually know what you want.”

“What do you mean?” he asks, hoping he doesn’t seem too shaken.

But Gordon has already got up to leave, coffee untouched, leaving the other customers staring indiscreetly at the boy sitting alone, disconsolately eating the cream off the top of a Mocha Cookie Crumble frappuccino with a plastic spoon.

 

 * * *

 

He wakes up to the buzzing of his phone. It's Monday, which means he's going to have to face his new _employees_. Maybe Gordon. Unless Gordon has left forever. He doesn't know, really, and not knowing is strange, the whiplash of the last few days wrong-footing his usual certainty.

He picks up the phone.

“Hi, Peter.”

“Have you checked Twitter yet?”

“No,” Tony replies, rubbing his eyes. “Should I?”

“Do you believe there’s no such thing as bad publicity?”

“Yes?” He catches a sight of himself in the mirror. Somehow, he’s shocked to find that the lack of sleep has left him looking exhausted.

“You’re about to stop believing,” Peter replies.

 

* * *

  
The posters are everywhere.

 He catches sight of the first one before he’s anywhere near the shop: an overexposed negative of his face against a black background. He looks  _demonic_. They've even given him crazed red eyes. And underneath, in huge white letters:

 

NEW MAN, NEW SCAM

_Anthony Blair, former lead singer of the band WAR CRIMES, now owns YOUR local record shop._

IS THIS A MAN YOU CAN TRUST?

 

“Jesus Christ,” he mutters, ripping the poster from the lamp-post.

“That," Peter suggests, nodding at the next one, "might be something of an exercise in futility."

“Oh, come on,” Tony whines. He pulls the next poster down, too, more in frustration than because he thinks it'll make a difference. It couldn't. The street is _covered_ in the things. “What’s this about?”

“The conglomerate,” Peter replies, as though this means anything. Tony blinks in confusion. “The congl- the people who want to buy the shop, Tony.”

“The _what_?” Tony is beginning to wonder if the past couple of days have been someone’s idea of a wonderful joke. Probably Robin's.

“Tanner-Oliver want to demolish the store and build a supermarket,” Peter says slowly. "Their parent company keeps trying to buy us out. Didn’t Gordon mention...?”

“Evidently not,” Tony snaps. He's never been able to find much patience for Gordon and Peter’s secret-keeping.

“Well, there’s hardly a lot _to_ mention, really,” Peter says, ripping another poster down distractedly. “They’ve wanted to bulldoze us for decades now. Hence Gordon’s obsession with keeping the finances in line. They’re absolute vultures, really– there’ll be no second chances, if we let it slip.”

“And they think they can– what?” Tony asks, confused. “Bully me into selling the shop? I don’t like bullies.”

“How convenient,” Peter says, unconvinced and unimpressed. “Because you’re going to have deal with a couple of them before we can get any work done.”

He nods towards the shopfront, where Harriet, Robin and Margaret are huddled with folded arms and sour expressions.

 

* * *

 

There’s a moment’s debate over whether or not Peter is allowed to stay for the meeting, which Tony wins, and then a democratic vote, which Tony loses. Peter rolls his eyes and leaves in the mildest of bad tempers, promising to drop in later, and Tony turns back to the others.

“Is it true, then? You got Red’s?” Robin asks first.

“What nonsense is this in front of the store?” Margaret demands, holding a poster.

“Are you going to make coffee or what?” Harriet inquires.

Tony inhales and locks the shop’s front door before responding.

“All in due time,” he says politely. “About your questions–”

“Can you just get on with it?” Margaret demands.

“Ok. Alright,” Tony replies. “Yes, Robin, I did get the store. Margaret, they’re nothing to do with me and I’m as confused as you are. Harriet– yes– I’ll make the coffee.”

There’s a moment as Robin’s reply, _fucking farcical_ , mixes with Margaret’s _dismal_ and Harriet’s sigh of relief at the prospect of coffee.

“Why did you get the shop?” Robin asks without preamble.

Tony shrugs.

“I suppose John thought I’d be good at it,” he offers.

“Fucking typical,” Margaret grumbles, walking off. “I was his manager for five years, but of _course_ the posh pretty-boy gets the place.”

“Margaret,” he tries to argue, but she’s already marched into the office. The empty office. The absence of Gordon in a place so inherently _his_ stings more than Tony cares to acknowledge.

“She’s right,” Harriet says. “Red’s has had five owners in thirty years, and none of them were women, either.”

“Wait, what?” Tony asks. “How’s that my fault? I didn’t ask for that to happen, did I?”

“Doesn’t change the fact there’s something very sexist about it,” she points out grimly.

“Well, I’m sorry that I’m a man, Harriet.”

“Disclaiming the need for personal responsibility is how sexists perpetuate patriarchal models of power,” Harriet announces matter-of-factly to the shop in general. Then she walks off after Margaret.

So it’s just Tony and Robin; Robin aggressively trying to wipe an invisible stain from the counter, and Tony furiously debating with himself how to talk Margaret and Harriet around.

“Giving the store to a man stupid enough to be in a pop punk band called _War Crimes_ …” Robin mutters to himself. It’s loud enough for Tony to hear, though, and Robin knows it.

“You know, Robin, sometimes I think you don’t respect my brains. They may seldom be much in evidence, but I do have some,” Tony tells him, half-joking.

Robin raises his eyes to look at him.

“Well, it seems obvious that the shop should have gone to someone else,” Robin stops his pretend wiping to look at him.

“Ok, so you also think I’m a sexist? Or John–?”

“No,” Robin interrupts.   

There’s a pause.

“I wanted the shop.”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Tony exclaims. “What next? Am I going to find out that Jez wants the shop, too?”

“I know more about this store than you– I know more than _Gordon_ ,” Robin snaps back. “There’s no reason at all for _you_ to have it.”

He throws the flannel to the ground in indignation, and joins the other two in the office. Tony knows it’s not big enough for three people, but there he is, supposedly so wonderful with people, with all three of his employees crammed into a cupboard just to avoid him.

Not for the first time, he wonders if Red’s is really worth all the _trouble_.

 

* * *

 

Peter and Philip help him to close up the shop, the other three having vanished the moment their shifts were done; Tony toys with the idea of firing the lot of them and running Red’s alone, but the impracticality of it is immediately obvious. Besides, Gordon might return, and finding the entire staff gone would only incense him further. Tony still thinks there’ll be a limit to how long Gordon can resist returning to the shop, but his confidence has begun to waver.

“We’re all finished,” Philip says, smiling and pushing his glasses back up his nose. “And Peter checked the books for you,” he adds, with a faint pride.

“Oh, thank you, Philip,” Tony says, exhausted.

“No problem.”

“And Peter, as ever,” he says, winking at Peter and eliciting a sharklike smile.

They move out to the street, finally closing the shop doors. Tired as he is, Tony is reluctant to go home to eight sleepless hours thinking of Gordon and of the shop and of the frankly ridiculous number of people in his twitter mentions calling him a cunt.

He can feel a headache forming.        

“Do you want dinner? I’m starving.”

“We do,” Peter says, slinging an arm around Philip’s shoulders. “But I really don’t think you should come with us, Tony.”

“Oh? Why’s that?” Tony asks, smiling and waiting for the punchline.

“Well, for one thing,” says a familiar voice behind his back, “it would be pretty rude of you to stand me up like that."

Tony turns in surprise, and is caught completely off guard to find himself faced with exactly the person he'd known it would be.

“Cherie,” he says, trying not to sound too dazzled.           

He’d dated Cherie for six months; they’d still have been together if it had been Tony’s choice. She’d been brutally clever and uncompromisingly ambitious in a way that had made him desperate for her approval, which he’d lost dramatically by deciding to abandon the Bar and become a musician. Law had always been her life. They’d gone their separate ways after that, and she’d got herself a big office in an expensive postcode, and he’d found the shop and Gordon.

(He still has a tiny playlist for her, though, on his phone.

 _Born to Run_ – Bruce Springsteen

 _Heroes_ – David Bowie

 _Girlfriend is Better_ – Talking Heads

 _You Really Got Me –_ The Kinks

And, added after she ended it;

 _These Boots Are Made For Walking –_ Nancy Sinatra) 

“Happy to see me?” she asks.

“Of course,” he tells her with a sunny smile, before remembering Peter and Philip, and catching himself. “We all are.”

“Are we?” she asks, eyebrows high with disbelief.

Peter bows, dramatically deferential.

“Cherie! A  _pleasure_. Of course we are.”

“It is nice to see you again,” Philip assures her, managing to sound a little more sincere. “Did you get my note? I was th–”

“Unfortunately, we are leaving,” Peter cuts in firmly, steering Philip away. He gives Tony his most Peterish smile. “Have fun, darling.”

“He won’t,” Cherie says, amused. “I’m here in a legal capacity.”

 

* * *

 

She takes him to a restaurant he can’t afford (he wonders how bad exactly the shop's debts are, then prays he'll never have to find out) and announces that she’ll be paying for dinner, which reminds him beautifully why he always liked her so much.

They make small talk, at which Cherie is absolutely terrible, but after she orders his food for him (he'd liked that, too) she leans forward in her chair with a grin.

“I’ve got something for you. We’ve been hired to go over John’s papers.”

“Oh,” he says, remembering her earlier claim to be on business. “That’s nice. Well. Circumstantially obviously rather sad for all of us, but…”

“Yeah,” she interrupts, eyes twinkling. “I’ve got some papers for you to sign.” He cocks his head and smiles winningly at her.

“And it was absolutely imperative that you, personally, came to tell me this over dinner, right?”

She looks mischievous.

“Maybe not  _absolutely_ imperative."

“I’m glad you did.” He moves his hand to touch hers, and she doesn’t stop him.

“I’m dating someone, Tony,” she says, gently. He doesn't move his hand. “I started dating him after we broke up." She stops to think about it. "Well, just before, actually.”

Tony sits back in his chair and laughs.

“You didn’t have to tell me that,” he says. It sounds slightly pained.

“Neither of us are interested in second place, Tony,” she points out, as their meals arrive. “So did your... man... take it badly, not getting the shop?”

“Gordon's just–” he realises the mistake half a second too late, and tries to fix it. “You mean Gordon, right? You've always called him _that man_ …”

She’s laughing, not quite with him, though he ends up laughing too.

“So it’s bad, is it?”

“Yeah, and he’s one of thousands.” It’s supposed to sound funny. It doesn't, somehow. “Gordon, my employees, what seems like half of the population of Twitter...”

She rolls her eyes, unsympathetic.

“You want the place,” she says. It’s not a question.

“Yeah,” he says, dejected, before realising that that’s not right. He _really_ wants the store. He wouldn’t fight Gordon for less than a lot. “I do,” he says, with resolution. They’re staring right at each other now.

“Prove it,” she tells him, flatly.

She’s right, as usual. Of course she’s right. 

“I will,” he vows, mostly to himself, and she nods, satisfied.

“It won't be puppies and rainbows and people telling you they love you,” she adds, gravely. He knows she’s thinking of her own job. “I know this might come as a shock to you, but you do have to work for things sometimes.”

“I know,” he says. He suddenly really wishes he could convince her to ditch her boyfriend and come with him. He knows better than to think he can, though.

“Good. Get to work, then.” 

He smiles at her. He can see tomorrow in his head, the next day and the day after that, everything lining up and stretching out into a path towards the moment he gets everything he wants. It looks _brilliant_.


	4. Team

 

There’s a pot of fresh coffee and a more or less clean store waiting for Margaret when she arrives and she stands baffled for a second, trying to decide what kind of strange parallel world she’s walked into, before catching sight of Tony beaming alarmingly at her from behind the counter.

“Morning, Margaret,” he calls sunnily, straightening up.

“Tony,” she says, voice tired. “What are you doing here?”

“I work here,” he replies, still genial, pouring two cups of coffee. Then he grins, with a decent show of embarrassment. “I own here, actually.”

“So I’ve heard,” she mutters, cautiously accepting the cup. “You’re early.”

“I am.”

“What is it, Tony?” she asks, still suspicious.

“Responsibility,” he pronounces solemnly to the empty room. It sounds a little excessive; Margaret looks unimpressed. Perhaps a different approach, Tony decides, for dealing with the others.

She ignores him when he tries to ask her about her morning, poking away at her phone instead, but he’s sure she’ll come around eventually. Perhaps when the others get onside. They sit together in silence for a while until the sound Robin and Harriet chatting as they enter the shop becomes audible.

“No, I’m absolutely serious, he’s going back to Edinburgh,” Robin is insisting. “There’s no way he’ll ever work for Tony. The bastard’s too proud.”

“I just don’t see it! He wouldn’t throw his whole life away just because he’s mad at Tony.”

“Well, he’s got Princess Records to go back to, hasn’t he? I mean, I know I would…”

Tony’s heart drops a little. It’s not as though he can’t tell who they’re talking about, but he steels himself and smiles when they notice him.       

“Tony?” Harriet asks, wary and surprised. “What you doing here?”

“I’m here for you, in a way,” he replies, more cheerfully than he feels. “For all of you."

They both look rather sour; he makes them both coffee. They send confused glances in Margaret's direction, but she only shrugs.

“I’m glad we’re all here,” he begins, with the enthusiasm of a young priest before a new congregation. “You see, I have some plans for how we–”

He’s interrupted by the sound of the door opening.

“Sorry, we’re not open quite yet,” he calls politely. They ignore him, and Tony sighs, irritated at the disturbance.

“I only need a moment,” he is assured by a rather gentle-looking man with thick-rimmed glasses and neat grey hair. He wouldn’t look threatening, but he’s flanked by about five or six men in grey suits.

Something about the sheer number of them is unnerving; Tony exchanges a worried glance with Margaret. The store’s been robbed before. Never by middle-aged businessmen in suits and spectacles, though.

“You knew about this?” Harriet asks, in a whisper.

“Not at all,” he admits grimly.

“Don’t worry,” the greyish gentleman assures him. His voice is rather thin and reedy. “We’re only here on business.”

He holds out a hand to Tony with a bland, slightly nervous smile. “Mr. Blair, I’m Mr. Major. I’m here on behalf of the Tanner-Oliver Roberts & Yamata conglomerate.”          

Major’s handshake is rather limp; Tony is half-convinced he’s about to break a carpal bone. Major flexes his fingers afterwards with a slightly affronted smile.

“We’ve heard you recently acquired this shop,” he explains; Tony thinks he seems a little colder.  “We have a lot of interest in it, you know.”

He blinks owlishly, glancing around the place. Tony can almost see the mental calculation as Major concludes that it doesn’t amount to much. Tony recognises the look from countless customers. He recognises the feeling from his own assessments of the place.

“So I’ve heard,” Tony says.

He finds himself wishing Gordon was here. This is clearly going to be a matter of money, and a matter of strength.

“We’d like to make you an offer for it,” Major says, with a small smile. His eyes flit to the stormy faces of Harriet, Margaret and Robin.“Could we talk in your office?”

“Oh, God,” Robin says, faintly. “He’s going to sell the store, isn’t he? This is it.”

Tony raises his hand, feeling the need to forestall a burgeoning revolt.

“Whatever you have to say, Mr. Major, you can say in front of my employees– I’m a pretty open sort of owner.” He pauses and takes a breath. “And I have to tell you, right away, that I’m not interested in any offers to sell the store. At all.”

A portly gentleman with rosy cheeks and Hush Puppies shambles forward with a good-natured smile.

“This, by the way," he booms, "is the offer John’s on about." He hands Tony a cheque with a conspiratorial wink.

Tony reads it. He reads it again. He counts the zeros in confusion, then realises his hands are shaking.

“This for five million,” he says, very slowly.

“Yes,” Major agrees, patiently.

“Well, that’s the store gone, then,” Margaret exclaims, disgusted. Robin looks pale. Harriet looks defeated. Tony is still thinking about the zeros.

“This store, Mr. Blair, owns a considerable amount of debt, does it not?”

He probably shouldn’t know that, but Tony’s brain is busy singing the Flying Lizards’ cover of _Money._

“You have nothing to gain by keeping it,” Major points out, still sympathetic.

“This is so undignified,” Robin spits. He sounds on the cusp of storming out. Harriet shuffles her feet and waits. He can feel Margaret’s eyes on the back of his head.

“I’m not interested,” Tony hears himself say.

The room goes quiet with tension. Tony realises he has the absolute attention of his employees.

“I’m not interested,” he says again. He realises with a jolt that he’s serious.

Major’s eyebrows flicker fractionally, profoundly alarmed.

“Mr. Blair,” Major says, very gently. “You are an ambitious young man and like all ambitious young men you are fond of expensive things. You are not ideological or sentimental. You don’t care about Red’s any more than anyone cares about their dead-end job.” He pauses thoughtfully. “If I had to guess, I’d say you’d have voted for Nick Clegg in 2010.”

Tony can almost _hear_ , behind his back, Robin's silent agreement.

“In a sentence, you are not like the rest of these people.”

Tony nods, suddenly smiling broadly.

“Well, that’s all lovely," he says, handing the cheque back to Major, "but you don’t really know me at all.”

“Take the money, Blair,” snaps another of Major’s men, gaunt and rather long-haired; he’s spent the whole conversation staring contemptuously at his boss, and seems to have grown impatient. “You’re not an idiot enough to say no.”

Tony turns to look at him, and suddenly feels light with power and certainty. He takes the cheque back from Major’s hands and examines it again, theatrically. He’s as sure of himself as he ever been.

“Yeah?” he asks, voice loud.

He rips it in two.

Someone gasps, and Tony feels justified and blessed and morally righteous.

“You don’t really know me at all,” he repeats, calmly, “but I met quite a lot like you at school. And you know what I see when I see you?”

He rips the remaining pieces in two again.

“ _Weak_. I see a group of _weak–”_ he rips once more– “and spineless men who think they can buy _my_ store by– what? Intimidation and cash? I’m not intimidated by _anyone_ , Mr. Major!”

He throws the pieces in the air, half for effect and half for the sheer joy of it, and has to suppress a grin at the look on Harriet’s face.

Major watches dispassionately as the shower of paper flutters to his feet dispassionately. Tony feels like he’s floating, a giant among very small people, a kind of electricity in his spine. His staff are smiling, he realises. Even Major’s people look a little impressed by the virtuoso performance.

He presses on.

“So you and your lot can go back to your _weak_ owners, and tell them that I am _not_ a weak man, and that I won’t be bought,” he tells them. There’s a flinch in Major’s eyes at that. Tony suddenly fears he might apologise.

“Weak. Weak. _Weak_.”

There’s a long, rather bitter pause.

“Very well.” Major says, sounding rather tired. “There was no need to make everything so difficult, Mr. Blair.”

They file out, somewhat awkwardly; Tony’s legs give up on him and Margaret has to hold him still.

“Oh, God,” he says. He feels rather sick. “I said no to all that money.”

“I know,” Margaret assures him, guiding him to a chair. “We were there. We’re very proud of you.”

“I like money so much.”

He thinks he might actually vomit.

“I like money so, so, so, so much.”

“I know.”

“I don’t have any money, Margaret,” he whines. “I don’t have any money and I love money _so much_.”

“We’re all in the same way, mate,” Robin says acerbically, but he pats Tony’s shoulder with a kind of awe. “Well done.”

“Oh _God_ –”

“There, there.”

Harriet offers him a glass of water, which he takes with shaky hands. She watches him drink, thoughtfully.

“Maybe John was onto something, giving you the shop.”

She smiles at him.

“You’re not bad at all, Tony,” she says, thoughtfully. “Apart from, you know, being a man and everything.”

Tony grins into his glass of water. Margaret and Robin make quiet noises of assent, smiling too, and Tony starts to feel a little better; less like an alien body and really part of the shop.

 

* * *

 

Sue turns up in the afternoon, just as she usually would, except that usually she’d turn up to help Gordon.  Margaret ushers her into the office, where Tony is curled up unhappily in Gordon's usual chair, attempting to determine exactly how deep his newly acquired debts are. (He tries not to think about it like that; it makes him want to scream and ring up one of Major’s grunts imploring them to take the damn thing.) Sue’s impatience turns to pity as she watches him rummaging frantically through Gordon’s mountains of paperwork.

“Hi, Tony,” she says, as he lifts his eyes from the paper. “Enjoying power?”

“Well,” he admits, “maybe not this bit.”

She takes the nearby chair. He wants to ask about Gordon; when Gordon’s coming back, whether Gordon’s still mad, whether she thinks Gordon might somehow contrive to be mad at him forever. He bites his tongue instead.

She clears her throat.

“I’ve just come for the bag, Tony.” She leaves the obvious _for Gordon_ implied.

“Sue,” Tony says in his most serious and thoughtful voice, “you know I value your opinion.” She looks suddenly wary.

“I’m glad to hear that.”

“And I know that other people do, too,” he presses on.

“I do hope so,” she says, acidly.

“And as such, I was wondering if–”

“Tony,” she interrupts him, voice firm, “there’s no chance of me playing messenger between you and Gordon.”

“Oh, come on,” Tony wheedles. “Sue, please– he’s being ridiculous–”

“Yeah, but I'm not sure he’s the only one.”

“Sue, I’m in love Gordon,” he blurts out, and immediately regrets it. “I mean– I love Gordon. I like Gordon. I think he’s… he’s really talented, he’s really good for the shop. The best.”

Sue is wearing an expression Tony remembers from the day they’d watched Jez lose control of his bike and land flat on his face. Tony tries to pull his dignity out of this wreckage.

“I need Gordon. Here. In a professional capacity, not in a romantic– or– or a sexual way, but I do need him, is what I mean.”

Christ. Tony starts to wonder if he’s been cursed. He’s supposed to be good with people. He’s supposed to be good with _words_. Sue clearly doesn’t know whether to laugh or to sympathise, and he can’t really blame her.

“Tony, I’m going to get the bag,” she says, gently. “And go." He deflates a little.

"And when I see Gordon this evening," she continues, "I will tell him that you turned down five million pounds to keep his precious shop out of conglomerate hands.”

Tony sighs in relief, running his fingers through his hair.

“He’ll probably just call me imprudent or something,” he mutters to himself, half-buoyed on baseless hope.

Sue smiles.

“Well, for what it’s worth,” she says quietly, tucking Gordon’s bag under her arm, “I think he needs you too.”

And then she leaves, and Tony returns to Gordon’s accounting books and the thankless task of deciphering Gordon’s furious illegible scrawls in the margins of pages.

 

* * *

 

His phone pings softly in the middle of the night, waking him from an unsettling dream about overdue bills. He panics for a moment, half-expecting to hear that the shop’s caught fire, the shop’s been robbed, or that he’s being arrested for tax fraud because of some amazing mistake.

Then he realises it’s just Gordon. He calms for a moment, before remembering that there's nothing _just_ about a text from Gordon any more.

Then he wonders if there ever was.

 _I heard you turned Major down,_ the message reads.

 _Yeah,_ Tony writes, not _Christ alive, Gordon, it’s the middle of the night,_ or _Thinking of me_ ?  _:)_ , as he usually would.

He waits for the reply, and he can see Gordon writing and rewriting his message for the longest time with typical Gordonish hesitation.

 _I’ll be coming back to work tomorrow,_ he finally sends.

It’s not a request but a statement. Tony feels like a good boss would demand contrition or something, but all he can feel is relief that Gordon will be back in his life, the irreplaceable piece of machinery in the store and his life.           

 _Good. We’ve been overworked without you._

He doesn’t get a reply so he sends:

_We could hardly keep the store tidy, and I’ve always said it should be cleaner than clean. And I don't like overworking them. I’ve been trying to be a good boss._

He regrets that almost at once, re-reading it with a pained grimace at the ceiling. Gordon, he knows, will feel personally wounded by the reminder of the shop’s new ownership.

His phone pings again.           

_Goodnight._

Tony thinks about writing _I’ve missed you so much_. He thinks about writing _I’m not upset about the last few days, even though you’ve been a dickhead. I just want things to be the way they were._ He thinks about saying _I want you so much that even thinking about seeing you again is a turn-on._

 _Goodnight, Gordon,_ he writes, and wills himself to go back to sleep.

He can’t.

 

* * *

 

The next day he is met by three very angry employees fuming over the fact that Gordon has only made coffee for one.

Despite his own exhaustion, the noise, and the lack of coffee, Tony can’t help but smile.

 

* * *

 

At first things seem to settle back into a colourless facsimile of their old routine; Gordon hidden in the office, juggling numbers, and Tony out playing salesman in the store. Now, though, instead of going to check on Gordon, make sure he’s ok, Tony sends in Margaret or Harriet (he tried to send Robin exactly once; there had been a crashing noise. Robin had come back doused in Coke).

The kids still come in, though now they actively avoid Tony. He laughs it off, tells Margaret he doesn’t miss the twice-weekly grillings from Ed Balls. It takes him less than a fortnight to realise that he _does_.

He gets used to getting the bus home, and used to not having to wish Gordon would let him drive.

 

* * *

 

Peter has plans.

“A relaunch,” he says, watching Tony and Harriet close the store. “For the book signing in two weeks.”

“Are you still doing that?” Harriet asks absently.

“Now more than ever,” Peter replies for him; Tony gives him a look, and he sighs. “Tony, you know it’s vital that potential new customers are introduced to you in a way that isn’t through posters with demon eyes.”

“I know,” Tony assures him.

He can hear the uncertainty in his own voice.

Peter– and Philip, less aggressively– have been pushing the idea of a relaunch for days now. Their suggestions are hardly new (Tony can remember Gordon agitating for every single one, over the years), but they’re sorely needed; fresh paint, more space, better lighting, less  _clutter_.

“So you know we _have to_ do this,” Peter insists. “I'm almost certain I can get Alastair Campbell here for the after-party, but–”

“ _The_ Alastair Campbell?” Tony asks, a little impressed. Anyone who was anyone wanted to hear Campbell spin. “The DJ?”

“The one who had that mental breakdown and put on nothing but _Reckoner_ for three hours?” Harriet asks, and Tony frowns at her.

“He got better,” Peter says, dismissively. “Tony?”

Tony nods, slowly.

“The problem is,” he points out, “that all these things… need money.”

“It’s an investment! You need to spend money to make money.”

“Yes, but to spend money I need to... ” Tony leaves the rest of the sentence unvoiced.

“Is it normal for male relationships to be this grounded in fear?” Harriet muses, only a little sarcastically. “It all looks terribly unhealthy to me.”

“I am not _afraid_ of upsetting Gordon,” Tony whispers furiously, insulted. He’d have shouted it, he thinks, were he not afraid of upsetting Gordon.

“It’s your shop,” Peter says, shrugging laconically. “And– though Gordon might disagree– your money, and your decision to spend it.”

Tony frowns, stares out of the window, and says nothing.

This, he reasons to himself, was what Gordon had always wanted anyway. A store that could sell itself to the public. The relaunch would have been exactly the sort of thing he’d have pushed for before John died. Tony wonders, briefly, if Gordon is so mad at him that he’d dismiss it just to be petty. He can’t imagine it, is almost ashamed of himself for thinking it, but they’ve spent days avoiding each other now.

He’s not sure he can stand and listen to Gordon rejecting him again.

He exhales, and gives in.

“Fine, let’s go talk to him,” he concedes, getting to his feet. Peter nods, face a mask of comically solemn gratitude, and Harriet moves to follow the two of them.

“Er. In private, Harriet,” Tony says, as politely as possible. She snorts.

“The two of _you_ are supposed to convince him this is a good idea?” she snaps. “He can’t _stand_ y-”

“ _Thank-you_ , Harriet,” Tony interrupts her, his voice perhaps a little shrill.

Seeming to sense the scale of her mistake, Harriet backs off. Honestly, Tony thinks, watching her leave, Red’s doesn’t have a single _normal_ person in it apart from him.

 

* * *

 

Tony hovers nervously, in front of the office door, then knocks before walking in. It’s unfamiliar and distasteful, really, the idea of having to be formal and careful and restrained around Gordon. God knows the rest of the shop seem to think of Gordon as some species of dangerous wild animal, but Tony’s never regarded him as anything but tame– sometimes too trusting, often almost naive, reliant on Tony for guidance when other people, less tactful, less understanding, intrude too far into Gordon's intensely private world. He misses that peculiar kind of power, really, as much as he misses the easy familiarity, or the thrill of arguing, or Gordon humming to the Mountain Goats.

“What is it?” Gordon asks, voice gruff as ever, but without the old warmth. “What’s  _he_ doing here?”

Tony isn’t sure whether this is in reference to him or to Peter, so he answers for them both.

“We were hoping to talk to you about the shop,” Tony eyes the nearby chair, but decides against moving the stack of papers Gordon’s left on it, and perches on the corner of Gordon’s cluttered desk.

“ _He_ ,” Gordon snarls with a disdain and disgust normally reserved for cockroaches, “doesn’t work here.”

“Peter is here to help me–” Tony begins, but Peter puts a hand to his shoulder.

“Don’t bother,” he says softly. “He’s been like this since–”

Tony nods, not wanting to hear the rest of the sentence; Gordon clenches his jaw and shifts in his chair so he doesn’t have to look at Peter. Tony sighs and shifts a little backwards into his line of sight.

“We want to do a relaunch,” Tony says, watching Gordon’s brow furrow. He can read Gordon well enough to know it’s not with worry.

He explains every detail to Gordon, slow and steady, and he’s good enough of a salesman to feel by instinct where he’s caught Gordon’s interest. He _knows_ when Gordon is unsure, and returns to every decision he seems unconvinced by, pausing when Gordon wants to interject, ask a question or make a point. It feels good– more impersonal than their old debates and quarrels, babbling away at one another and somehow walking away of one mind– but it’s as close to that as anything he’s had in days.

Finally, sensing Gordon grow impatient, he moves to the point.

“So you see, the problem–” he opens, but Gordon interrupts him.

“You need the money,” Gordon concludes, low and thoughtful.

“Yes.” He doesn’t want to ask permission, but he feels like he should. “Is that possible?”

“No,” Gordon tells him, frankly. Their eyes meet. “Not on our budget.”

“Oh,” he sighs, defeated, and then turns to Peter. “Well, I suppose we could just market something less as a relaunch, or…?”

“I have the money,” Gordon continues, still expressionless. “The rest of the money John left me.”

“That’s your money,” Tony says, fast. He knows Gordon’s been struggling with rental costs recently. “I won’t ask…”

“It’s for the shop,” Gordon says, like it’s obvious.

“Even so, Gordon–”

Gordon shakes his head, his mind already set.

“I’ll arrange it.”

Tony fights his first impulse to pull Gordon into a tight hug. He fights his second impulse, as well, to offer Gordon his hand. They stand awkwardly for a moment until Tony nods, and Peter leads him by the arm from the cramped little office, leaving Gordon alone in his world of numbers.

 

* * *

 

Tony dreams that he and Gordon are characters in _Julius Caesar_ that night. His knowledge of Shakespeare has always been a bit shoddy, though, and halfway through the speech bit it all becomes distinctly more like Roman-themed gay porn. He wakes up sweating and needing to get off, and his day only gets worse after that.

His phone pings as he gets out of the shower.

 _DO NOT CHECK TWITTER UNTIL WE’VE TALKED,_ Peter’s message says.

His phone goes off again. Reading the new message, Tony suddenly regrets having got out of bed.

Is there, he wonders semi-hysterically, any way of saying _I had some American friends over last year, a couple, and he was handsome and charismatic and tremendous on the saxophone, and she was smart and serious and fun, and it was October, there’d been a million Halloween parties, and I ran out of costumes before I ran out of enthusiasm, and they let me borrow one, and then we were drunk and someone had a camera_ in a way that could possibly make the entire episode sound as sensible as it had seemed at the time?

He doesn’t write any of that.

He sits on his bed and stares numbly at the text.

There is probably no sensible-sounding answer, he decides, to _Why is there a video of you grinding up against some American and his girlfriend dressed as bloody Bambi?_

 

_* * *_

 

“Why’s this just gone viral now?” Tony demands of Peter, who sighs in long-suffering fashion. “Is this Major again?”

Peter snorts.

“I _wish_. No, this isn’t about money. _This_ ,"Peter announces with a theatrical flourish, “is just evil.”

He hands Tony his phone. 

 

@wheelthemin

_People talk about his demon eyes but he’s got demon moves to match :') :') :')_

 

“Oh, right,” Tony says, bitterly. “I should have fucking known.”

Charlie hates him. Having judged Tony to have committed the cardinal sin of commanding Gordon’s attention, the guy had appointed himself to the role of avenging angel the moment they’d met. Tony wouldn’t mind competition– Tony’s never met competition he couldn’t beat– but Charlie devoted his considerable energies to making him look bad in front of Gordon, often successfully. Worse still cold, creeping feeling that Tony comes away with every time the meet; the suspicion that, if it came to it, Gordon would choose Charlie’s friendship over his. He tells himself it’s irrational.

He knows it’s not.

“Hey, Bambi!” some random guy on the pavement opposite shouts at Tony, “Looking good!”

Tony heroically endeavours to keep his smile friendly.

“Is this going to be, you know, forever?” Tony mutters to Peter in quiet desperation.

“There’s a video going half-viral of you playing the, ah, deer meat in a bisexual sandwich as _Pull Up To The Bumper_ plays in the background,” Peter says, a little amused. “It’s going to be for, you know… a while.”  

They're stopped three times more before Tony reaches the store.

 

* * *    

 

He prepares himself for a barrage of mockery, but none is forthcoming. Margaret is busy at the computer, editing the stock lists for the website; Robin is futilely attempting to engage her in a debate on Sufjan Stevens’ work and its underappreciated place in left-wing discourse; Harriet stops cleaning for half a moment when she hears him come in and, seeing him, rolls her eyes and returns to work.

Tony sucks the air in through his teeth, and forces a bright, beaming smile.

“Alright,” he says, loudly, “let me have it. Everyone gets a go.”    

They look up at him, confused, faces unanimously blank.

“What are you talking about?” Margaret asks, not sounding terribly interested one way or another.

“The video. The... memes. I’m sure you’ve got all your brilliant jokes at my expense prepared,”  Tony replies, impatient to have it over and done with. “Come on, then.”

“Tony, we all saw that video when you posted on Instagram, like… six months ago,” Robin points out, incredulous.

“And it wasn’t terribly interesting back then, either,” Harriet adds, frankly.

Tony raises a single suspicious eyebrow.

“Really?”

He looks from Margaret to Harriet and back to Robin, all of them extremely bored and tired.   

Maybe he had overestimated this whole thing.   

“Besides,” Harriet adds, not looking up from the cleaning. “Why on earth would we make fun of our dear boss?”       

Margaret breaks into a fit of giggles. Robin actually snorts.

Tony exhales. Well, he thinks to himself. Things can only get better.

           

* * *

The store is unusually full today, and they all begin to juggle customers and sales with exactly the efficient brilliance that makes them all such nightmares to work with. Some of the new visitors have come clearly to get a look at Tony, see if he’s quite _as promised online_ , but despite the occasional references to deer costumes and demon eyes, most end up finding some record or CD that they want. Tony supposes he can live with a little temporary embarrassment in the pursuit of healthy profit margins.

After what seems an eternity selling records and politely refusing people trying to pull him (it’s happened before, but it’s never happened _this much_ before), he takes a break and heads out for a smoke. He weighs up the morning, staring down the alley with glazed eyes, and concludes that on balance, no real harm has been done. He flicks through his unopened messages, trying to distract himself, as he smokes.       

_We need to talk._

It’s from his dad.

Rage blossoms in his chest, unfamiliar and fierce. He drops the cigarette, crushing it under his foot as he marches, face set, back inside. He barges past the alarmed faces of Harriet, Robin, and the surprised clients, and makes straight for Gordon’s office, not bothering to knock before walking in.  

“What do you think you’re doing?” Gordon begins, irritated. He isn’t expecting how uncommonly angry Tony is.

“You tell your fucking _goons_ to back off,” he says, brandishing his phone. “Tell him to leave me alone.”

Gordon peers at the screen, squinting slightly, face thunderous. It takes him a moment to understand, and when he does, he decides not to be outdone in outrage by Tony.       

“I don’t fucking control Charlie– even if I did, I– what’s your problem with someone sharing a fucking _public_ video?” he snarls back, so angry his face flushes.

“He knew what he was fucking doing!” Tony yells, incensed. “ _You_ know why he’s done this now.” Gordon flinches, the angry flush draining from his face.“Well, brilliant, Gordon, because now I have to explain the concept of bisexuality to my _dad_.”

“I am surprised there’s a soul on Earth you _haven’t_ explained it to,”  Gordon growls, and it’s his defence of Charlie, rather than the words themselves, that sickens Tony in a way he can’t bear to examine. He doesn’t want to find, now of all times, that he’s jealous.

“Maybe I’ll explain it to _your_ parents next,” Tony shouts, venomous. “Explain to them what their precious son was doing kissing me in his flat the other day.”

It works, for a given value of 'works'. This time, Gordon actually turns _pale_ with fury.

“Get the _fuck_ out of my office!” he screams, painfully loud, heart-stoppingly angry. He gets to his feet; for a moment, Tony thinks Gordon is going to hit him. He doesn’t flinch away, though, and Gordon’s fingers close around his shirt-collar, dragging Tony from the room by sheer strength.  “Go and play to your fucking _audience_!”           

Tony is thrown out with such force that he staggers and almost falls as Gordon slams the door so hard that the frame shakes. Inside, there’s the  dull thud of something very heavy hitting the thin carpet.           

“ _Fuck_!” Gordon barks from behind the door, panicked. The doorknob is rattled; nothing happens.     

The sharp stabbing anger in Tony’s throat subsides a little as he calms, realising that Gordon has managed to break the door handle.  He laughs, high-pitched with residual hysteria.           

“Are you fucking _stuck_?” he demands, incredulous; he’s still shouting, but the absurdity of the situation is oddly comforting.

“You fucking _know_ I am!” Gordon screams back, further incensed by the indignity of the situation. Tony giggles.

“I should leave you there,” he says, grinning. “Until you learn to behave a little better.”

“YOU'RE NOT FUCKING KEEPING ME HERE!” Gordon shouts, and there’s a pounding against the door.           

Tony can’t decide if he wants to help Gordon or leave him to his pointless fuming. It’s not good, he thinks, for Gordon to get this angry; he’s going to end up hurting himself trying to break down the door.    

“Hey!” Robin calls, irritably. “Bambi and Thumper, could you please tone it down? You’re scaring our customers.”

“He’s stuck,” Tony calls back, and moves away, delegating the problem.           

He doesn’t hang around to wait for Robin to free Gordon, and ignores the arch look he receives from Margaret when he informs her that he’s going home for the day.

* * *

In the evening, Peter comes to check on him.

He’s spent the whole afternoon sprawled listlessly over the sofa, watching cartoons in his boxers and drinking the remnants of a bottle of gin that he’d been saving until he remembered to buy tonic.

Peter is unimpressed.

“Goodness me,” he remarks acidly, perching on the arm of the sofa fastidiously. “And I thought I was supposed to be the specialist in one-man pity parties?”

“Leave me alone, Peter,” Tony whines, quite patently wanting sympathy and hugs. “I’m miserable.”

“Yes. It’s not pleasant, is it, being outed?” Peter’s voice is a little gentler, and ruminative; Tony knows he’s been in a similar situation before. “How did it go?”

“He’s– well, he’s not happy,” Tony says succinctly. He shuffles a little to rest his head against Peter’s legs.

“They rarely are,” Peter says, wryly. His expression is kind, though. Then, as though the words were dragged from him; “It gets easier, you know.”

Tony sighs, long and sulky. He knows, really, that this hasn’t been the worst thing ever to have happened. No bridges have been burned. Nobody’s died. But yet again, someone seems to like him a little less than they had before, and it eats away at him. He’s always loved popularity.          

“I wish I could just hate Gordon,”  he mumbles, largely to himself. “I feel like that’s what he wants.”

“Gordon wants a lot of things,” Peter remarks, in a far-away sort of voice. “Very few of them would actually be any good for him.”

They sit in silence for some time, both thinking of the same dark, Scottish problem, Peter absent-mindedly playing with Tony’s hair. Tony attempts to envisage what life would be like if Gordon left the store. Even as a hypothetical, it’s an unpleasant thought.   

“I bet this type of thing never happened to proper leaders,” Tony says, suddenly and Peter gives him a curious look. “Like... Margaret Thatcher... I bet she didn’t have to put up with this type of thing. They wouldn’t dare do this to her.”    

Peter laughs at that.

“Oh, you’re looking up to Thatcher now?” He shakes his head. “You’re more right-wing than I am.”

“You’ve blown a _real-life Tory_!” Tony defends himself, but he can’t help but laugh.

“You’ve rimmed a _Republican_ , darling, and not the good kind.”

“Once! I was in Texas! They’re _all_ Republicans there!”

“Oh, and the months of texting afterwards?” Peter mocks, expression gleefully disbelieving. “I did see some of those, you know.” He adopts a lovestruck falsetto. “' _I’ll be with you whatever happens_ '?”          

Tony laughs.      

“I’ve got poor taste in men,” he admits.

He looks at Peter, chuckling softly above him. Peter loves him; Tony is suddenly pitifully grateful for Peter’s love and loyalty, and alcohol and gratitude and sheer _loneliness_ strike him so suddenly that he doesn’t think to question himself as he kneels up next to Peter, pulling Peter’s face down with a hand in his hair and the other slipping up his thigh. When their lips meet, it’s awkward and rather messy, and Peter pushes him away.

“Not that I’m not flattered,” Peter says, eyes amused and voice cheerfully sarcastic, “especially after that little pronouncement– but I do have a boyfriend, Tony.”

Tony frowns, petulant.

“You don’t have to lie to me,” he says, sharply, offended by the idea that Peter being dishonest with him.

“I live with him, actually,” Peter clarifies, and Tony smiles, gently disbelieving.

“You live with _Philip_ ,” he points out, unable to leave the point when Peter is _lying_.

He thinks about it for a second.

“Wait.”

Peter watches him make the connection slowly.

“Are you... dating Philip?” he asks, speech filled with unnecessarily long pauses.

Peter preens, horribly smug.

“Took your time.”

Tony’s head hurts. He wonders whether it’s an impending hangover or simply the attempt to absorb the information. He thinks for a moment about Philip, and how he'd stopped smiling completely when Peter left the shop the first time, after his fight with Neil. He thinks about Philip telling him sadly, _I need courage and Peter Mandelson_ , and how he'd laughed and agreed,  _we all do_. He thinks about Philip describing Peter as _a multitude of contradictions_ with a look of indescribable softness.

Tony had just assumed they were very good friends. 

“How did I not know this?” he demands, still baffled.

Peter shrugs.

“Because you’re... you,” he says quietly. He sounds a little wistful; Tony avoids his eyes. “Don’t look like that,” Peter adds. “How were you to know? I didn’t tell you.”

Tony frowns.

“Am I a terrible selfish person, Peter?” he asks, because he knows Peter will say no.

“No,” Peter replies. “You’re an excellent selfish person.”  

Tony pouts a little, settling back onto couch. Peter smiles at him.

“I always thought you had a thing for me,” Tony admits, slowly. “Or for Gordon.”

Peter shrugs.           

“You’re both very charming when you want to be,” he admits, and then sighs. “But I think it’s rather too much to demand that anyone be as obsessed with either of you as you are with each other.”

Tony doesn’t have much to say to that; he lets the words sink in. Even after the events of the past weeks, they feel somehow right.

“Besides,” Peter adds, after a while, “I think I like nice men.”

Tony fights the urge to point out the overwhelming evidence to the contrary; then the urge to claim that _he_ is nice.

“Philip is probably the nicest,” he admits to the ceiling.

“He is.”

For once, Peter’s smile neither implies nor hides anything. Tony looks up at him and realises, reflecting on the past few months, that Peter had slowly been becoming happy right under all their noses.

* * *

 

On Wednesday morning, whilst custom is still slow, the store gathers to haggle out exactly how much is to be thrown out in Peter and Tony’s shiny new relaunch.

“The Marx poster goes,” Tony announces, to a collective low whine of protest around the shop. “Oh, come on. It’s a _records_ shop, not the Durham Miners’ Gala. It makes no sense to keep it.”

“No sense at all to a cold-hearted neo-capitalist, I’m sure,” Robin complains, “But–”

“You sound like Mac,” Tony tells him, resolve stiffening, and he scribbles _Marx poster_ in the GOING list.   

Robin shrugs.

“Mac isn’t wrong about _everything,_ he’s just a prick,” he insists.

“And a bully,” says Margaret.

“Yes, b-”

“And a misogynist,” Harriet adds.

“Is he?” asks Tony, interest piqued. “Because I always th-”

“Tony,” Robin says loudly, "the poster. The shop should have some personality.”

“It should,” Tony agrees, amicably. “And I’m trying to make sure that that personality isn’t _deranged._ ”

He underlines _Marx poster_ in the GOING list, then underlines it again.

“We might as well be any other store, if you do this,” Robin squawks, red-faced.

“Ordinary stores,” Tony reminds him, “have customers. Which would be nice.”

“Margaret, Harriet,” Robin pleads, “back me up here.”

Harriet shrugs.     

“I’m more interested in your plan for getting rid of the giant rat living in the trash can in the back, actually,”  Margaret says pointedly. Robin deflates a little.

“Good old Claws Three.” Harriet sounds almost nostalgic.

“No, the one that needs to go is Claws Four,” Margaret corrects her. “Nobody’s seen Claws Three in ages.”

Harriet looks upset.

“What happened to Claws One? I've not seen it in ages. Is it–?”

“Yeah.” Margaret looks suddenly a little ill. “Jez ran over it on his bike.”          

This sort of absurd sentimentality, Tony remembers abruptly, has always been considered the height of informed discussion at Red’s.

He misses Gordon desperately.

* * *

He arrives on Monday morning and it’s _crowded_. It’s never crowded this early. He blinks, and examines the sea of bustling customers to the best of his sleep-deprived ability.

They’re old. The shop is crowded with old ladies. Nobody here is younger than sixty-five; the few normal early stragglers pass, take a cursory look at the new clientele, and hurry on. There are maybe forty of them, all talking away excitedly amongst themselves, inspecting the records with disapproval and CDs with open distaste.

They’ve had older clients from time to time– the nostalgia of the vinyl brings a few in– but but they’ve mostly been men, and mostly alone. Tony worries suddenly for the records they keep prodding and tutting at, and attempts to summon up some charm. Older women, in his experience, are the one demographic that don’t seem to care for him, but customers are customers, so he puts on his nicest smile and attempts to feel positive about the whole situation as he makes his way over to where Margaret, Harriet and Robin are stood with frozen looks of despair on their faces.

“So,” he attempts, glad to have the counter between him and the geriatric mob. “We’ve already begun to diversify our public.”

There’s very little appreciation for this joke; Tony decides they’re probably all still tired.

“It’s weird,” Margaret says to him a low voice, careful not to disturb the old ladies loudly proclaim their complete disdain for all music produced by humans too young to remember the Attlee governments. “They came in here, like, all at once, and none of them have bought a thing. Like every grandmother within five miles decided to come along and judge us all of a sudden.”

“They’ll probably be off soon,” Tony murmurs under his breath, as one of them mutters something that sounds a lot like ‘filth’. “There’s probably just some knitting convention nearby or something, and they decided to drop in because they still haven’t caught up with the invention of the mp3.”

“Maybe it’s a witches’ convention,” Robin mutters. Unfortunately for him, Harriet hears him.

“Sexist. I get to choose a song in your playlist next.”

“That doesn’t count! I wasn’t being sexist, I just don’t like old people,”  Robin protests. Harriet looks sceptical.

“They are getting in the way of our usual customers, though,” Margaret points out. “Nobody wants to be in a store full of old people. And they’re not buying anything- if they were kids, we’d have thrown them out.”

“We don’t throw Balls and Whelan out,” Robin points out, acerbically.

“That’s different,” Tony says quickly.

Robin raises an eyebrow.

“Look,” Tony says, “they’ll be gone soon.”        

The ladies don’t leave for the rest of the day.

* * *

He thinks the long nightmare is finally over on Tuesday, but they come back. There are _more_ of them, bloody hell. And they seem angry, Tony thinks, squeezing through the throng to reach Robin at the counter.          

“What the hell is going on?” he asks. “Where are Harriet and Margaret?”          

Robin removes an earbud to talk to Tony.

“They’re in the office, trying to keep Gordon away from you,” he says, sipping his coffee. Tony frowns.

“Right. Why’s Gordon mad at me now?” he asks, wondering if he’s managing to break some kind of record.

Maybe Gordon has decided that being Tony is now an utterly unforgivable crime rather than the sort that gets you a fifteen-year sentence, he thinks, serving himself of some coffee.

“ _You_ are mad at Gordon,” Robin says, interrupting this train of thought. “Or you will be, when you find out what he’s been up to.”          

Tony feels panic rising, and smiles calmly.

“And what has he been up to?” Tony asks, trying to keep his voice level. Robin shrugs.

“I’ve been sworn to secrecy. Threatened, actually,” he admits, then nods at the loudly complaining geriatric rabble. “But I don’t blame them for being cross.”          

Tony doesn’t like the sound of this. He steels himself and strides into the office without knocking; the door has hung perpetually ajar since Gordon broke the handle. Margaret is talking.

“Listen, Tony can’t know about th–”

She falls silent. Gordon stares at the floor as Tony steps into the office, squeezing for space.

“What can’t I know about?” he asks, voice amicable, chest tight with fear.

Margaret grimaces. Nobody answers.

“So?” he asks again. “What are my lovely employees doing here, in our very cramped accounting office, instead of out there dealing with our very angry customers?”

Harriet mumbles, blushing, and Margaret looks evasive. Gordon says nothing, jaw set. Tony knows he won’t crack Gordon; if he could, life might’ve been much easier.

He smiles thoughtfully at Harriet.

“Harriet,” he says. “If you could tell me what’s going on, you can have the shop for your Women’s Group meeting after we close on Thursdays.”

Harriet’s eyes widen.

“Margaret wanted Gordon to tell the women to go away because they’ve been scaring away all the customers and haven’t bought a thing and then Gordon went out a there was an argument and he called some woman bigoted and now they all want his head on a plate,” she says without pausing for breath. Margaret groans. “I’ve trying to get the shop for Women’s Group for ages!” Harriet tells her defensively.

“Gordon,” Tony says, slowly, attempting to get his head around the absurdity of the situation. “Why did you call an old lady... that?”

Gordon looks at him. He’s blushing a little in a way Tony can’t pretend to be completely immune to.

“I called her bigot because she’s a bigot.” He says it firmly, but his ears are still red, and Tony knows it stings him that he can’t ever just get it right with people.

Tony holds his gaze. He knows that he could gloat, laugh at how badly Gordon needs his help. He wants to feel justified in letting Gordon crumble and collapse. Part of him wants to do it just to prove that he can hate Gordon.

He can’t.

“I’ll sort it,” he says, careful not to seem too generous.     

Gordon relaxes, insofar as Gordon ever relaxes.         

He goes back into the shop trailed by Margaret and Harriet, apologetic smile on, big blue eyes at their best, charm turned up to eleven.

“Which one is Gordon’s bigot?” he asks Margaret under his breath. She nods discreetly in the direction of a particularly angry-looking woman.      

Right, Tony thinks. Let’s get this over with.          

He moves through the handbags and cardigans with concentrated politeness and grace, and walks up to the old lady in question.      

“Hi. I’m Tony Blair, I’m the shop owner,” he greets her, smiling widely in his very best teacher’s-pet, choir-boy, son-in-law-of-your-dreams manner. “I was told there was problem with one of my employees?”

“He said I was bigoted!” she snaps quickly. “ _Very_ rude– called me bigoted for no reason! Just because I said that–”

“And I’m very sorry,” Tony interrupts her gravely, not wanting to hear the rest. “The employee in question has been dealt with, and as an apology, I’d like to offer a fifty per cent discount on–”

“I don’t want any of _this_ ,” she says loudly, looking faintly disgusted at the idea of actually buying anything. It's the best news Tony's heard all day.

“That’s a shame," he says, beaming from ear to ear, "but since you’re leaving–”

“Are you trying to kick us out?” another lady demands, sounding affronted. “We won’t be kicked out!”

“Not at all!” Tony replies, fast. “I merely assumed, since you’re not buying anything–”

“He’s trying to kick us out!” someone screams. Tony senses the situation slipping away from him.

“Naturally I don’t want to kick _anybody_ out, but–”

A terrible sound starts up amongst the ranks of the old ladies. It takes a moment for him to process it, and then it hits him.

It's a slow clap. They are _slow-clapping_ him from his own shop.

* * *

 

Tony goes back to the office, defeated.

“What is the matter with these people?” he asks, shell-shocked. “They treated me like dirt.”

It comes out rather closer to a whine than he would have liked, and the other three offer him very little by way of sympathy.

“That’s what I’m saying,” Margaret replies with a worried look. “They’ve just taken over the place. It’s like... invasion of the grannies out there.”

“We should call the police,” Gordon growls, arms crossed, clearly too angry to be baffled by the ridiculousness of their problem.

“No.” Tony says emphatically. “It’d be a disaster.”

“We can’t afford another day of no sales,” Gordon tells him flatly.

“We also can’t afford to call the police on a bunch of old ladies,” Tony tells him. Gordon looks unconvinced, and Tony catches his eye. “ _Gordon_ ,” he says, softly, “think of the headlines.”

Gordon nods reluctantly and looks away.

“It’s fine,” Tony says, trying to convince himself. “They’ll be gone tomorrow. This is just temporary.”

It sounds less convincing the second time around.

* * *

On Wednesday morning, they turn up again. Come lunchtime, not a single record has been bought.

Tony despairs.

“Why can’t we just call the police?” Harriet complains. “They’re _loitering._ Aren’t they?”

“Headlines,” Tony moans, burying his face in his hands. “Imagine the clickbait. BISEXUAL DEMON BANS GRANDMOTHERS FROM SHOP.”

“Beast,” Robin cuts in. “They’d want to alliterate on the b sound. BISEXUAL BEAST BANS GRANNIES.”

“Shut up, Robin,” Harriet says.

Robin sighs and grumbles under his breath a little.

“Listen, I can handle this,” Tony says without conviction, rubbing his eyes. “I’ll handle it. I just need to understand why they’re doing this and then I’ll... handle it.”

He’s not quite sure he’s making sense. He hasn’t slept properly in weeks, haunted by fears of overdue bills and Gordon leaving the shop and a relaunch swamped by the angry slow-clapping of little old ladies.

Harriet ignores his mumbling and turns to Gordon.

“Gordon, you’re strong, loud and horrible to people, can’t you just hurl them out of our shop?”  she asks in desperation.

“Harriet,” Tony says, gently, “remember what I said about headlines?”

“Yes,” she says, “but–”

“And who do you think,” Tony continues, still softly, “taught me the importance of avoiding bad press?”

Gordon stares at the desk.

“A three-year-old, actually, judging by your recent efforts,” says Margaret.

“Yeah, and why doesn’t anyone ever ask _me_ to hurt old ladies?” Robin asks, a little offended.

“You’re a pacifist at heart, Robin,” Harriet explains, “you wouldn’t even hurl Jez and Mac out of the shop.”

“They were fans of my band!” Robin says, defensively. “I’m only showing _gratitude_. Unlike _some_ people.”

Gordon’s eyes remain down, but his jaw is set and Tony knows trouble is coming.

“No hurling!” he proclaims, with less authority than he would have liked. “No hurling. You two, go with Margaret, and don’t do anything without permission.”

Robin exhales through his nose in exasperation. Harriet is already putting in earphones to drown out the angry chatter.

“Nutters,” Tony says, mostly to himself, when they’ve left. He rubs his eyes again and tries to hide a yawn. “How much more of this can we take?”

Gordon’s face is dark.

“Two days,” he says, “if we continue not to make any sales.” He pauses. “What we get online can last us until Friday.”

“ _Christ_.”

Tony feels like screaming. Taking a deep breath, he gives a hollow laugh instead.

“Might end up with a clickbait headline anyway, then. Depraved bisexual demon bankrupts beloved local shop in under a month–”    

“It wouldn’t be your fault,” Gordon cuts in, still staring resolutely downward. When he speaks again, his voice seems distant. “None of us could take this.”

“I just need to understand what they _want_ ,” Tony says, tiredly, closing his eyes for just one second. “If I can get that out of them, I can get them out of the shop.”

He notices suddenly that Gordon is tense, and then, opening his eyes, realises that his forehead has somehow fallen against Gordon’s shoulder.

There’s an awkward moment before Tony very slowly moves away.

“I’m going to–” his face feels hot with embarrassment, but Gordon is still gazing resolutely at the floor. “I’m going to– I need to go handle this.”

He flees the scene.

 

* * *

  
His phone pings with a message.

 _Meet me at the Tanner-Oliver offices in Smith Square. Nos. 32-34._

He doesn’t recognise the number. He knows the address, though. There’s no way he’s walking into Major’s centre of operations on the say-so of a number he doesn’t recognise.

 _Who is this?_ he writes. He’s not terribly suspicious- there’s no way Major’s people would be this clumsy- but if Peter has descended to this level of melodramatics, he’s going to scream.

 _It’s about your store,_ the next text says. _Just do it, posh boy >:|  
_

Tony exhales, a little frustrated. He's not _that_ posh. The emoticon really does rule out any of Major’s goons, though. He doubts any of them know what an emoticon  _is_.

 _Fine,_ he writes back.  _But in the car park, not the offices. And if this is a set-up and I get murdered, I’m leaving the shop to Gordon._

And, he thinks to himself grimly, you’d have an interesting time trying to get rid of  _him._

* * *

The car-park is empty when he arrives. Tony feels extremely stupid. For all the eventualities he’d turned over in his mind, the possibility that it might have been a prank-call hadn’t occurred to him. He’s moments from leaving when he hears his name from somewhere between the silver Audi and the blue Jag. 

“Tony,” he hears someone call a little louder. “Over  _here_.”

He ignores his better judgement and follows the sound of–         

“Oh,  _great_ ,” he groans, when he realises who it is.         

Diane. In a suit, for some reason. Maybe he  _is_ going to get murdered. Maybe Mac will jump out from between the cars and stab him in the name of True Socialism or whatever, and he’ll die, and the store will go to one of Gordon’s kids, and they’ll play U2 every day or do something equally stupid and  _then_ –         

“Diane, this isn’t funny,” he begins, making no effort to conceal the exhaustion in his voice. He’s about to ask her what the hell she thinks she’s doing on Major’s doorstep, when he pauses for a moment.

She’s wearing a  _suit_. Her hair is tied up.  _Neatly._ She’s wearing makeup, and it’s both discreet and inoffensive. His eyes go to her shoes.         

They have  _heels_.

“Oh my God,” he whispers, stunned. “You  _work_ here. You work  _here_! You’re a corporate stooge!”          

He can’t believe it. She’d once called him a Tory sellout hypocrite fascist for drinking _Starbucks_.        

“Shut up!” she snaps annoyed. “I only have to work here because red Tory puppets of the Murdoch media like  _you_ ruined the chance for a truly transformative left-wing government–”          

“Me?” Tony says, high-pitched. “I was  _six_  in ‘97, Diane! They weren’t asking for  _my_  advice!”         

Though if they had, he’d probably have advised them to be braver with their use of the PFI.   

“Did you just call me here to scream at me about the failures of the last Labour government?” he asks, trying to regain control of the situation whilst stifling a yawn. “Or was there, you know, a point?”

Diane glares.

“I wasn’t going to help you,” she says, as though explaining to a child why he’s really very lucky to be allowed up past their bedtime and God, he really is tired, “but I don’t trust you not to sell the store at this rate.”

Tony is a bit offended by this, but bites his tongue and smiles pleasantly.

“Tony, your problem with the old ladies?”

He nods.

“How do yo–”

“They’re being paid. By the conglomerate.”

“Oh, don’t be ridiculous,” he blurts out.

He didn’t come here to be fed half-baked conspiracy theories. She squints at him, clearly indignant.         

“I’ve seen them do it before,” she says. “It’ll ruin your business.”

Like he doesn’t know _that._

“I could show you the memos, if I thought it was worth risking my job,” she explains slowly. Tony bristles a bit at the condescension in her voice, but she doesn’t sound like she’s lying. “They run everything through separate ventures rather than Head Office, so it can’t be traced. Then they hire out a local Conservative Association or the Wembley WI to crowd a store for a while and drive out all the custom. Nobody can kick them out because it looks bad, and if they do, Major’s friends in the press massacre them for it.”          

Tony considers this for a second.        

“And it works,” he says. “It’s brilliant.”

“I think you mean  _evil,_ ” she corrects him.

“Well, it’s not the sort of thing I would do,” he concedes, “but it’s so  _smart._ It’s absolutely suffocated the shop, but you’d never prove they were being– are they being paid?”

“Sort of. They shut down three small business last year. And apparently due to the generosity of an anonymous donor the Wembley parish hall has been completely renovated.” She looks disgusted. “ _Capitalism_.”

Tony thinks it actually sounds rather sweet.

“Diane,” he says suddenly, as she turns to go. “How am I meant to get them  _out_ of my store?”

“I don’t fucking know, do I?” She replies, angrily. “Try coming up with your own ideas, Tony.”

“You hate my own ide–” he starts, but decides to drop it, and smiles instead. “Well, thanks for the tip.”

“I’m only doing this,” she tells him, “because I’m going to own Red’s one day, and I’ll never get it if you sell out.”        

He sighs and watches her return to her cushy office job, thinking of generous salaries and Christmas bonuses and feeling faintly jealous.

* * *

 

He closes the shop in order to remove what he’s now pretty certain is the entire branch of the local WI, who huddle on the pavement outside like zombie horde in a post-apocalyptic movie.

“So they’re being paid,” Margaret says, thoughtfully. “Can’t we just offer them more money?”

“We don’t have more money,” Gordon and Tony say in perfect chorus.

Gordon looks at him, intense as ever, a strange look on his face. It might be gratitude. Then again, it might be something else. Tony blinks, trying to focus on the task at hand.

“What we have to do,” he says, thoughtfully, “is make sure it isn’t worth it.”

“What do old ladies hate that much?” Harriet asks, sounding exhausted.

“Europe,” Robin says promptly.

“Equality,” Gordon adds, smiling gruffly.

“Anything to the left of Mussolini.”

“Anywhere to the north of the Cotswolds.”

They actually bump fists. There  _is_ something they hate more than each other, it seems.

“Are there any Scottish Labour members in the room?” Margaret asks, deadpan. “It’s hard to tell.”

“Anyway,” Tony points out, trying to hide a smile, “you can’t turn the store into Europe. Or Scotland. What else do you have?”

“Sex,” Harriet says. “Old people hate sex.”

“Welfare recipients.”

“Ripped jeans.”

“The gays.”

“When you say ‘happy holidays’ instead of ‘Merry Christmas’.”

“Anyone who isn’t white.”

“Anyone who’s white, but not from a country they l-”

“I’ve got it,” Tony says, quietly.

He thinks this might be a bad idea, but it’s the best he’s got.

“Open the store,” he tells them.

* * *

Their silver-haired saboteurs fill the store almost immediately. Tony has to admire their commitment. He wonders if he’s got enough to break them.    

“Ok,” he says. The old lady Gordon insulted prods a record sleeve in disapproval. They have to go.

He grabs Gordon’s hand, earning himself a quizzical look.

“Gordon,”  he whispers. “You know how you hate me?”

Gordon is still staring at their entwined fingers.

“Yes,” he says. Tony tries not to look hurt. 

“You’re about to hate me quite a bit more.”

He pushes Gordon against the nearest wall before he has time to react and closes his eyes, kissing him as hard as he dares. He knows Gordon isn’t going to play along immediately, so he’s more forceful than he might’ve been– well, he's got to make it _work_. He thinks he hears noises of disgust behind them, and then he definitelyhears the jingle of someone exiting the shop. He kisses harder at the small victory, ignoring the awkwardness of kissing Gordon again, and what it means that Gordon still hates him.

“Gordon,” he says against Gordon’s mouth, “it’s not going to work if you look like this is making you physically ill.”

Gordon remains completely still for an agonising half-second before pulling Tony close with a strength he’d only ever fantasised about, hands on Tony’s hips, mouth open and tongue demanding. Tony thinks his knees are going to give in, barely paying attention to the steady jingling of the shop door as Gordon flips them, pressing Tony against the wall with an aggression that makes him moan. It feels divine, Gordon’s fingers curling around the back of his neck, and he’s pretty sure this has done the trick but he lets his hands creep up under Gordon’s shirt, wanting more because he always wants Gordon  _closer_.

Next to them, Margaret clears her throat pointedly; Gordon very slowly steps back, detaching Tony’s hands in the process. He looks flushed. He looks  _horrified_. To Tony’s disappointment, he pulls his shirt back down, frowning.

Tony tries to steady his breathing.

“I think we got most of them out,” he says, looking around.

There are only three ladies left, looking slightly disheartened but apparently unperturbed by enthusiastic homosexual displays of affection.

“That was pretty good, Tony,” Harriet admits with a smile. “They couldn’t handle the, er, the handsy part. I heard a lot of muttering as they left and it was all  _extremely_ discriminatory.”

“Well, you know,” he says modestly. “Anything for the shop.”

“And what about the others?” Margaret asks, pointing at them.  

The old ladies blink at each other.

“My granddaughter and her wife are gays too, you know,” one of them says, chattily. “I’m sure they get up to all sorts.”

Tony resists the impulse to point out that he's actually bisexual.

“Shame about the others, walking out like that,” she continues, looking a little dispirited. “Do you suppose we’ll still get the money for staying?”

Tony assumes his most scrupulously sympathetic face.

“I very much doubt it,” he tells them. “The people who asked you to do this for them–”

“Lovely chap, he was. Nice smile. Hush Puppies…”

“Yes,” Tony agrees, trying not to seem impatient. “They want to bulldoze the shop and put a supermarket up.”

The lady in pearls tsks ferociously at this.

“They do, do they? How old’s the building, anyway? Victorian?”

“There’s some dispute,” Gordon mutters. His voice is rather rough; Tony watches with amusement as he tries to straighten his collar, causing it to stick up a the back in the process. “Over a hundred years, though.”

The one with the homosexual granddaughter shakes her head.

“Those lovely red brick houses, you know… they pull them down… it’s all concrete now.”

“Gordon,” Tony says brightly. “These poor ladies have just been abandoned by the rest of their friends. Since it’s really our fault for kissing in the shop, I think the least we could do is offer them a lift home, don’t you?”

Gordon, still looking vaguely traumatised, mumbles something unintelligible. Tony beams.

“I knew you’d agree,” he says warmly, before turning to the ladies. “Gordon will drive you home,” he informs them, ushering them from the shop. “He has trouble with his eyes, so you’ll have to forgive his parking–”

Gordon glares.

“–but he’s really very nice. I’m sure he won’t call any of  _you_ bigots.” He twinkles at Gordon. “Will you?”

“Don’t tell Gillian I said so,” one of the surviving ladies confides to Gordon, as they leave the shop, “but she most definitely  _is_ a bigot, you know. She was very rude about the lovely young lady who found her cat, just because she was a Romanian.” She pauses and frowns. “Or is it Bulgarian? I can never tell…”

The door closes with a jingle. Tony turns to Harriet, who is valiantly stifling a laugh.

“Clever of you to realise that kissing Gordon would bother them the most,” she says, knowingly. “Because of bigotgate.”

Tony laughs.

“Clever of you not to overplay your hand with the woman’s group thing,” Tony warns her, still friendly. She nods, getting the message. “I like bigotgate, though. Maybe we should all call it that from now on.”

It’s been a good day, he thinks, the taste of Gordon still on his lips.

 

* * *    

Peter has assured him that Alastair Campbell is on the verge of agreeing to it, and only needs little push. Tony is good at giving people pushes, so he's arranged to meet Campbell at a restaurant he’s wanted to try for ever, without knowing how to justify the expense. He’s dressed, after some effort, in way that implies effortless cool. He tries not to think about how much he wants Campbell to agree and smiles as he sits down.     

“Hi!” Tony says. “I’m Tony Blair; I guess Peter’s told you...?”

“I know,” Alastair mutters, not lifting his eyes from the menu. Then he looks up, wearing a humourless smile. “Bambi, isn’t it?”      

Tony laughs as though he thinks that’s funny.       

“I suppose I should’ve expected that you’d have seen it,” he says with a slight shrug.

“Yeah well,” Alastair says, eyeing the the drinks menu with distaste. “If I hadn’t, I’d be the only one. Orange juice, please,” he adds, to the waiter.  

Then he looks at Tony, who toys guiltily with the stem of his wineglass.

“You want me to play in your shop?”

“Well, I -” Tony prepares to assault him with flattery, but Alastair isn’t interested.

“Because from here, I don’t see much reason to help out Peter’s furry friend,” Alastair cuts over him brutally. This is looking less like a little push and more like a full body tackle every minute.

He looks across the table at Alastair, smile still polite, reading his posture and the tension in his face.

“Well, Peter told me you liked Red’s,” Tony says cheerfully.

He thinks he’s about to get him.

“I do like Red’s, sweetheart,” Alastair says, ignoring the food as it arrives, “but–” the way he stabs his fork into the steak is a tiny passive-aggressive masterpiece, Tony thinks– “I’m not risking my reputation to help you out when all anyone in town can talk about is how the wrong bloke got it. You aren't worth that much trouble.”

If Alastair is hoping to unsettle him by bringing up Gordon, it doesn’t work. Tony knows better than to let any raw nerves over Gordon show.

“Surely not everyone,” Tony smiles, picking at his halibut in a desultory fashion.

“No? I know what those people think, Bambi. There isn’t a DJ in London whose opinions I don’t hear.” Alastair fires back. “And I don’t know why I should help you when they won’t.”       

Tony doesn’t reply, allowing himself to seem momentarily lost in thought. In his head, he sings to himself in John Darnielle’s voice–  _Lord, lift up these lifeless bones–_ letting the whole verse play out in his mind. He lets Alastair get impatient and very nearly angry as he keeps time like a beat, like playing with a band; to come in too early or too late would ruin the melody. He waits until Alastair’s body language betrays him.

And then he turns to look at him.      

“Can I say something, Ali?” he says, as though to a close friend.

“Don’t call me Ali,” he protests. Tony ignores him.

“Look, I’m not sure  _every_ DJ in London is thinking of my little record shop at all, you know,” Tony muses, absently. “But I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that they were all wondering whether Alastair Campbell still has it in him.”    

Alastair can’t seem to decide whether to be angry or amused.    

“You think?” he asks finally, looking closer to laughter than to leaving.

“Well, since the incident, you haven’t really done anything,” Tony points out, voice civil. “So people are beginning to wonder if you still c _an_.”

“Are you?”     

Tony smiles, wide and magnanimous. He waits just half a beat this time.      

“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t think you were the best.”      

Alastair seems suddenly almost vulnerable.     

“Aren’t you worried?” he asks. Tony knows he has him now.     

He shrugs.     

“I’m not worried if you’re not worried,” he replies easily. Ali frowns.

“And what if I’m worried?”

“I’m still not worried,” Tony says, sincerely. “They say all the good ones are a bit crazy, anyway.”     

Alastair, he suddenly notices, is smiling back. Probably, Tony guesses, against what he considers his better judgement.

“You’re pretty good, aren’t you?” Alastair says, because Tony’s got him and he knows it.

“I am,” Tony admits with a touch of pride.

“That why you always wear the shit-eating grin?”       

Tony laughs.       

“You like it,” settling casually into the borderline flirtatiousness that people politely describe to his parents as ‘charm’.      

Alastair doesn’t reply, but they both know it's true. Tony has a good feeling about this.

* * *

Tony doesn’t know much about Frank, except that he used to work in the store and that he and Harriet hate each other; because they went to school together, or dated at school, or maybe Frank just hates schools in general and Harriet went to a school, Tony still isn’t entirely sure. It’s Red’s. Someone always hates someone else for some completely daft reason. And Frank is still the only person who will do this for so little money in so little time.

“What about the lightning?” Frank asks, looking over the plans.

“Philip has the numbers,” Tony says, absorbed in the paint samples.  

In the periphery of his vision, he sees Frank look over inquiringly at Philip, and Philip’s expression of absolute panic as he casts about for the papers.        

“In your backpack, dear,” Peter says softly, not lifting his eyes from the paint catalogue. Philip utters a tiny sigh of relief and shoots a grateful look at the back of Peter’s head that makes Tony grin.        

Frank and Philip discuss what goes and what stays; Gordon cuts Frank off every time he becomes too vocal, to Harriet’s obvious delight.          

“Still undecided on the colour?” Margaret asks, settling next into the sofa next to them. “Oh, I like that one.  _Apple Red_.”

“A bit bright, isn’t it?” Tony asks. His eyes hurt from the endless examination of near-identical reds. “I was leaning more towards something with a bit more brown in it.”

Peter catches his eye. Tony knows how much self-restraint it takes him to abstain from a quip about how he’s sure Tony would just  _love_ a bit more Brown, and is almost grateful.

“It’s crimson,” Gordon says, deep voice so close that the two of them turn. There’s a slight growl in his voice, but Tony can tell there’s no anger behind it. “We’ve always agreed on  _Crimson Red_.”

Tony looks at him and smiles, almost managing to miss the way everyone stares at them.          

“Well, you heard him, Frank,” Tony says decisively, closing the catalogue. “Crimson.”

“Can I talk to you a moment?” Gordon asks. Tony nods happily, scrambling up from the sofa and trotting after him.

“What the  _hell_ is going on between those two?” he hears Frank whisper behind his back.

“None of your fucking business,” Harriet replies.

 

* * *

 

Gordon takes them to his office, and takes his chair. As ever, Tony has nowhere to sit; as ever, he perches casually on the desk, staring down fondly at Gordon. They’re not friends again, not yet, but some of Gordon’s resentment seems to have eroded in endless plans for renovation and the relaunch. Tony’s pleased, naturally, but his ambitions never seem to stop growing and he finds himself wanting Gordon again, half-believing it could happen. He watches Gordon shift uncomfortably, fiddling with his pen before gathering his thoughts far enough to speak.       

“The relaunch,” Gordon says, in his most purposeful voice.

“Yeah,” Tony agrees, not really needing the rest of the sentence voiced. “But I think it’s going well.”

“You know what you’re doing? Is everything according to schedule?”

“I think so,” Tony says, as gently as he can. He should probably be annoyed by Gordon’s endless need to micromanage. All he feels is the satisfaction of having Gordon’s attention, once more untempered by open hostility or vague accusations.    

“Tony, if this works,” Gordon says slowly, “if our numbers are right–”

“Your numbers are always right.”

“If our numbers are right,” Gordon says, smiling into his spreadsheets in a way that makes Tony’s chest warm, “if it works, I think it possible that we could clear enough debt to–”

“It will work,” Tony assures him.          

A silence, neither awkward nor comfortable, descends on the little office. Tony sits and muses on how long Gordon’s hair is getting. It’ll be past his shoulders soon. Gordon seems to struggle for words.

Finally, he just nods.          

“Good,” he says, at last, in a voice that means  _leave._

Tony could never really deny him anything.

He goes back to Peter and the others. They’re not yet the way they're supposed to be, and perhaps they won’t be for a long time, but Tony is confident of the history and the project that ties them together. He doubts, somehow, that even Gordon is strong enough to resist them forever.

 


	5. Criminal

It takes forever, but it seems no time at all before the relaunch is upon them. The store looks perfect, minimalistic and fashionably eccentric; red, but only a little bit. It’s beautiful. It’ll last a thousand years, or at least the next six months in the black, which is what Tony is really hoping for.

“Look at that,”  Tony says, with almost fatherly pride. “Isn’t she fantastic?”

“It _is_ an improvement,” Margaret agrees, anxiously straightening records behind the table where the book signing will take place. “I hope people will like it.”

“They will,” Harriet says, taking pictures with her phone. “We’re getting a _lot_ of likes on here.”

“You could always lend us a hand, you know, Harriet,” Margaret replies acidly. Harriet shrugs.

“Online presence is important too!”

Robin gives the store an appraising look as he helps Margaret move chairs around.

“I wish we’d kept the Marx poster,” he says, a little sadly, and holds his hands up in despair when Tony glares at him. “Sorry for being _left-wing_ , Tony!”

“You know what, Robin?” Tony asks sweetly. “When leftism pays our debts, it can run the shop.” Robin sighs and pretends not to have heard.

“So,” Peter says softly, near his ear, “the great work begins.” Tony turns to greet him, laughing, and Peter pats his arm fondly before moving off to check the lighting.

Tony looks around the shop, smiling. They really have done well to turn the shabby little cult store into something so appealing, he thinks. His eyes go to Gordon. Once they’ve got through this, he feels, everything will fall back into its natural place. Perhaps it’s just his natural optimism talking. Then again, perhaps not.

 

* * *

 

The shop is crowded, not with bigoted women or men in suits offering him millions for things he doesn’t want to sell, but with normal people, and people who like music, and people who like the store, and people who usually wouldn’t come to a record shop because it seems like a slightly odd thing to still exist in the modern age. Tony loves it; he loves people, loves being around them, loves the way the store seems alive again today, free of the faint despair that’s plagued it like a bad smell as long as he’s been there. Maybe it’s the free vodka Peter had produced for the relaunch, but he feels like the universe has finally stopped playing games with him and is nodding in approval.

Almost definitely just the vodka, he decides.

“Pretty good, isn’t it?” he asks Robin, who’s clutching a book about Crosland’s musical influences he’s hoping to get signed.          

Robin gives him a half-smile.        

“It’s not _that_ bad, I suppose,” he admits, awkwardly attempting to pat Tony’s back. “I mean, sales are looking better already.”

“All due to the hard work of my team!” Tony declares brightly. It’s loud enough for the others to hear, and Margaret smiles from behind the counter. Possibly at how badly he’s slurring.

“Mostly mine, though,” Robin jokes, and Harriet giggles.

“Taking the credit for female achievements is sexist,” she tells him, “and I should get to choose a song for your next playlist.”

They both laugh harder at this than the joke really deserved. Perhaps they’ve had some of the vodka, too.

Peter, when he finds him, is laughing and drinking as well, surrounded by a circle of people Tony’s never seen in the store in his life. They look affluent and happy, though, which is exactly as Tony believes people ought to be, so he approaches the little group with a glass in his hand, wearing his most blinding smile.          

“Tony, dear,” Peter says warmly, “we were just talking about what a wonderful job you've made of the place.”          

Tony shrugs, still beaming at Peter’s well-heeled friends.  

“He says these things,” he confides loudly to them, “but we wouldn’t have been able to do a thing without him, you know.”

He knows better than anybody Peter’s appetite for praise and publicity.

“Oh? Did he help you organise all this?” asks the man next to him, curious.

“It would never have happened without Philip and Peter,” Tony declares, more or less meaning it; from the corner of his eye, he catches Peter smiling into his martini glass. “And he also supplied the drinks, so we’re all heavily indebted to him.”         

There’s a hum of genteel laughter, and Tony relaxes. He feels more comfortable here than he has in weeks, effortlessly dazzling half a dozen strangers. It’s _right_. He refills their drinks, refills his own, makes perfect small talk, invisibly scanning the room for wherever the people seem too quiet or the glasses seem too empty.          

His phone pings; he excuses himself and finds a quiet spot to check it.

 _Hey, Bambi. Want a preview of tonight?_  

 _Hit me, Ali_ , he writes back

There’s a three-second delay before Alastair sends him a playlist.

 _Reckoner – Radiohead_ , it says.

74 times. 

Tony smiles.  _You wouldn’t disappoint me like that, Ali._          

It’s a whole minute before his phone goes again.          

 _No, I wouldn’t, you horrible bastard._       

Tony tucks his phone back into his pocket, still grinning to himself.

Walking back into the shop, the first person he sees– _quelle change_ – is Gordon. He’s talking to his kids, probably fomenting brilliant plans and explaining double-entry bookkeeping and talking about lyrics and beats and the superiority of vinyl to digitised music and why the Labour Party is sacred and how nationalism is bad even if it’s Scottish.

All the things they used to argue about, when they were friends.

Tony downs the remainder of his vodka coke. He can make this right again, he thinks, pouring another. If he can save the store, he can salvage his relationship with Gordon. He _can_.          

“Tony.”

He’s not sure when Philip joined him. Perhaps he’s very drunk. Perhaps he was just too absorbed in staring at Gordon. It’s hard to tell; Philip, peering up at him from behind unmistakably oversized spectacles under a mop of ridiculous hair, only looks as flustered as ever.

“John Major is here,” he whispers in awe.         

Tony checks his hair and offers Philip a cocky smile.         

“I know,” he says, with slightly drunken confidence. “I invited him.”          

He winks at Philip before locating Major in the crowd and moving steadily towards him.

“Mr. Blair,” Major says. He looks around the shop; he doesn’t seem quite so unimpressed any more. “Quite a party you have here.”

Tony smiles.         

“Call me Tony,” he says, shaking Major’s hand. “Delighted you could be here.”

“I was delighted to be invited,” Major says, scrupulously polite and perhaps, Tony thinks, a little sad.

“Can we take a picture? Harriet?” Tony asks, throwing a cheerful arm around Major’s shoulders.         

Harriet grins at him as she takes the picture; the smile Tony gives the camera is as wide as it is sincere. He feels almost recklessly victorious. Major does his best not to seem uncomfortable, and, to his credit, doesn’t appear much worse than normal in the pictures.        

“This is just the beginning of what I’m going to do here,” Tony tells him quietly, still smiling. “You should save that picture, John. One day, people will ask for proof when you tell them that you knew me.”          

Major looks almost amused.          

“You’ve chosen the oddest of places to channel that ambition of yours into, you know,” he says meditatively. “You could have had any one of half a dozen brilliant jobs in any of the conglomerate companies.”        

Tony glows back at him.          

“We’re going to make this place so profitable,” he continues good-naturedly, wondering who exactly he means by _we_ , “that eventually our little shop is going to buy out that conglomerate of yours.”

Major really does laugh at that.

They take another picture together.          

“We’ll see,” Major says, thoughtfully.         

“We will!” Tony replies jovially. “Enjoy the rest of the evening.”        

It’s not a win, Tony knows, but it’s close. His veins sing with divine certainty and vodka. This is going to work.

 

* * *

 

Heads turn in surprise when Alastair arrives, but the music is perfect, and someone– no, two people– no, three (Tony blinks. This is making his head spin) have begun to dance in the tiny confines of the shop floor. Tony counts five now. Six. Seven. Eight people dancing, more, people dancing everywhere, and Alastair is smiling because he’s got them, just as Tony got him. Tony smiles too, and tries to pretend not to be staring drunkenly at Gordon all the way through Belle and Sebastian’s _Party Line._ He looks away whenever Gordon seems in danger of looking back at him, eyes shifting over Ed and Harriet trying to outdo each other impressing Yvette, over the tall gawky boy trying to explain Aimee Mann to some tiny boy, over Robin drunkenly endeavouring to explain the concept behind his one experimental folk single from years ago. It’s incredibly stupid anyway– the lights are low, and Gordon’s eyes are far too bad for him to notice Tony staring from this distance.

“Careful, dear,” Peter says, materialising by his shoulder, “you’ll burn a hole through the wall with eyes like that.”

There’s a glass of what appears to be neat vodka in his hand. Tony takes it.

“Just… keeping an eye on things,” Tony says, taking a long sip of what does indeed transpire to be neat vodka. “Where’s your–?”

“He thought Major looked sad,” Peter says, looking amused. “He’s trying to cheer him up.”

“Oh,” Tony says, delighted. “He’s so good. He’s such a…” Tony frowns, trying to gather his thoughts. “He’s such a good person.”

“Yes.”

“I love him! He’s the best.”

“He can be blunter than anybody I know, but," Peter confesses, "there are moments when I feel distinctly like a rattlesnake dating a sparrow.” Tony laughs, rather high-pitched, and Peter looks back at him, raising an eyebrow. “Goodness, you _are_ drunk, aren’t you?”

“I’m a bit, er, joyful,” Tony admits, grimacing charmingly. “I may have gone a bit far.” He clears his throat. “I’m trying to sober up.”

“Yes,” Peter says, prising the drink from his hands. “So I see. Maybe stick to water from now on, though.” Then he adds, more kindly, “Don’t worry. This is almost over.”

“I never worry,” Tony lies cheerfully.

“No,” Peter agrees. “I do that for you.”

Tony is trying to find the courage to mention Gordon when he feels Margaret’s hand on his arm. He turns to look at her.

“Tony,” she says, looking oddly tense. “They’re back.”

 

* * *

 

Tony blinks, the alcohol slowing him down.

“Oh,” he says, when he finally realises who she must mean. “Them. The terrible three.”

“Yeah,” Margaret says. “And, er, Hilary.”

“Baby Benn?” Peter asks.

“Yes! The boy looks terrified.”

“I don’t blame him,” Tony says with some feeling, taking the vodka from Peter and downing the lot in one. “Ok. Let me go and solve it, then.”

“Tony,” Peter says, warily, “maybe we should have someone else handle it?”

Tony shakes his head, nerves steeled.

“I’m not that drunk, Peter. I can tell them to stop bothering us, you know.”

He can sense Peter’s hesitation, but he raises no further objections and Tony moves off through the crowd, ever so slightly unsteady on his feet, and goes out into the night air.

There’s a protest movement of three on the pavement; they’re giving out flyers, or would be, if there were any passers-by. They have, for some reason, covered their faces in red paint. Jez wields a rather ineffectual banner demanding that they _KEEP RED’S RED!_

Tony chuckles a little.

“Hey, Benn,” he says to Hilary amiably. It’s obvious the kid is blushing even under the red paint, and he stands a little apart from the others, shuffling his feet in embarrassment.

Hilary suffered from what Tony considered the cruellest trick the universe could play (after lusting after a boy who hated you); he was the shy child of an ostentatious father. Mr. Benn– ‘Big Benn’, according to Robin; ‘Hell Incarnate’, according to Peter– had worked in the store years ago. After Neil finally lost patience with what he later described to Tony as Benn’s _‘extremely principled and courageous attempts to completely destroy this shop, the street, and my sanity_ ,’ Benn had wisely left the store to dedicate more time to his art projects, and to encouraging the various activities of Jez, Diane and Mac.

Tony liked Baby Benn, though. Hilary was nice, he was polite, and he had an excellent taste in music.

“Hey, Tony,” Hilary says in a small voice, “I like your relaunch.”

“Pretty decent, right,” Tony says smugly. “If you get in, Alastair Campbell is playing some great stuff, and there’s a book-signing, and drinks–”

“That sounds fun... I er, don’t drink. But it does look nice.”

“You can join in, Hils.”

“Sorry, Tony,” he glances over at Jez, Diane and Mac apologetically. “I’m only here because Dad asked me to drive the guys around. Honestly, I just want to go to bed.”

Tony nods.          

“You’re a gentleman, Hilary,” he assures him. Baby Benn gives him a shy smile.

The three protesters are waiting for him as he approaches. Diane has her arms crossed. Jez is scowling. Mac stalks right up to him, brimming over with Mac’s usual aggression.          

“You think you can scare us?" he shouts in Tony’s face. "You’re fucking _useless_!"

“I wasn't planning to try and scare you, actually, Mac,” Tony sighs. He waves at Jez and Diane. “Hey guys!”

“Did you like the jam?” Jez asks, still scowling, to slightly bizarre effect. Diane rolls her eyes.

“I did, actually,” Tony replies. He had. It was a good jam. There is, Tony thinks, a use for almost everyone in society. “Er. Why are you protesting the relaunch?”

“You _know_ why, you disgusting yuppie,” Mac snaps.

Tony's not sure he does. He feels slightly lost.

“Well, alright. Listen, you’re welcome to join us in there, if you’d like,” Tony states, polite and firm. “Or you can go home, if not. But you can’t stay screaming outside.”

“We can do what we like,” Mac says, quiet and menacing. “It’s not like you can stop us.”

There’s a slight growling noise from just behind Tony that makes his pulse jump.

“Back off, Mac.”

Tony smiles to himself.

“It’s ok,” he tells Gordon. “I’ve got it.” He knows he sounds a little breathless. He doesn’t much care. He is, frankly, too drunk to put the usual effort into pretending not to want Gordon.        

“It’s fine,” Gordon assures him, not looking at Tony.

“This is pathetic,” Mac sneers. “You’re _pathetic_ , Brown.”

Gordon's hands are fists and his jaw clenches as he squares up to an unflinching Mac. 

“Gordon,” Tony says, suddenly nervous. The last thing they need is a fist-fight at the relaunch party, especially with Major still in there.

“Mac, let’s go,” Diane says. She sounds nearly as angry as Mac, and bitter, but both Mac and Gordon really do look about to start a fight, and Tony suspects she'd rather avoid a run-in with the police, too.

“You crawling little  _bootlicker_ ,” Mac shouts, “it was one thing to do this when you thought the store was as good as yours. Now you’re– what? Debasing yourself for _Bambi_?”    

Gordon looks about to do something stupid, but Tony is faster, his hand moving almost automatically. Agonising pain blossoms suddenly across his knuckles, and Mac is lying on the pavement, blood trickling from his nose.

“What’s your fucking problem?” Diane shouts.

Hilary runs over, looking alarmed as Tony shakes his hand. It _hurts_. He’s never punched someone before, ever. He discovers it isn’t a particularly pleasant experience.

Gordon is staring at him with the strange, oddly vulnerable expression he never seems quite conscious of; Tony tries to focus on defusing the situation.

“Mac, listen, I’m so sorry,” he begins. “I'm a little drunk and I wasn’t thinking.” He extends a hand to  help him up. “I’m really very sorr–”

Mac is on his feet before Tony can finish the sentence, launching himself at Tony in with unbridled rage. They tussle uselessly a moment; for all Mac’s bravado, he’s quite obviously more of a quitter than a fighter.

Then Mac manages to grab a handful of his hair.

“Oh my _God_ ,” Mac shouts, indignant. “You use hair cream, don’t you? Is there nothing about you that’s human, you pathetic corporate android?”

Tony kicks his kneecaps and attempts to scratch his face.

“Guys, please,” Hilary says, pushing them apart, “this is ridiculous.”

For a moment, the absolute authority he speaks with is uncannily reminiscent of his dad; then he looks up at Mac, tired and miserable, and the resemblance is gone. “This is ridiculous,” he repeats. “Can we go home?”

Mac sighs, and seems to regain his composure, or as much composure as he ever has.

“Yeah, you’re right. You’re right, Hilsdawg.”

Hilary winces at the name. Mac smiles at Tony, a strangely reasonable figure in spite of the paint and blood on his face. “Listen, sorry about this–  I was–”

“That’s alright. I mean, I punched first, and–”

Mac hits him so hard they both stumble backwards until Tony’s back hits the glass of a shop window; the impact sends them both flying right through it.

 _Shit,_ Tony thinks, over the sound of cracking glass, _we’re going to ruin the relaunch party,_  and then he hears the hollow thump of his own head hitting the ground, and blacks out.   

When he comes round, he struggles to keep his eyes open, alcohol and pain making the world spin. He’s still on the floor. Next to him, Mac moans something that sounds suspiciously like _‘you fucking bastard’_. Faces move in and out of focus; Mac is gone, suddenly; a voice that sounds like Peter’s says something Tony can’t quite make out. He tries to get up, but his head hurts, so he closes his eyes instead. Someone lifts him up and then lowers him into a chair– a sofa– no, a seat, a car seat– but he’s tired, drunk and bleeding, and despite himself, he falls asleep.

 

* * *

 

He wakes up in the backseat of a moving car. Someone is playing _Foreign Object_. And he has a headache. And his hands are full of glass.

He blinks.

Gordon’s car.

“Hey,” he says, but his voice sounds weak, and the music seems to drown it out.

His left hand is bleeding quite a lot; it doesn’t seem dangerous, but it feels strange, and it hurts.         

“Where are we going?” he asks, as loudly as he can manage.

“I’m driving you home,” Gordon tells him, meeting his eyes briefly in the rearview mirror. Tony thinks about asking if he's angry, but stops himself, which is promising– he must be a little less drunk now, at least.

“Is the relaunch–?” he asks tentatively.

“Peter took over. I don’t think anyone saw you and Mac, luckily.” Gordon must have noticed Tony’s confusion, because he elaborates. “You went through the window of the sandwich shop next door. Philip’s been in contact with them. It's ok, they're insured.”

“Oh, good,” Tony says faintly, shoving his bleeding hand into his coat pocket in an attempt to minimise the bloodstains he leaves on Gordon’s car. “So, the headline. The headline is still our successful relaunch?”

Gordon frowns, and Tony begins to panic before Gordon’s expression softens a little.

“This wasn’t ideal,” he admits, gruffly, “But Peter took over. No-one saw. Crisis averted,” he adds, attempting to park the car.

“Christ,” Tony says, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I never got headaches this bad before I had responsibilities.”

Gordon, straightening the car, doesn’t reply.

“Can you walk?” he asks, unbuckling his seatbelt.

“Hmm,” Tony replies, without a great deal of confidence, “I think so?” Still, when he moves his feet there’s no real pain.

Gordon helps him out of the car anyway; it makes Tony feels like a child, but he can’t bring himself to say anything, and they walk up to Tony’s flat in silence. Gordon steers him into the kitchen, telling him to wash his hands, then watches him as though not trusting him to do it properly.

He’s not _that_ drunk.

“I think that’s enough?” Tony says, slightly sarcastic. Gordon rolls his eyes.

“Go and sit down.”

“Can I put on some music?” Tony asks. It doesn’t really occur to him to feel uncomfortable about asking permission to play his own music in his own flat.

“If you like.”

In the living room, Tony puts on Fiona Apple ( _Shadowboxer_ ), and sits on the couch. His coat pocket, he notices, is wet with blood. He can hear Gordon shuffling around the kitchen, searching for something.         

“Do you have a first aid kit?” he calls.

“Er, cupboard under the sink?” Tony says, uncertainly. The little shards of glass are still bothering him. “But it isn’t much.”

“You don’t need much,” Gordon mutters. Tony pulls off his coat and then the shirt underneath, trying to shake the glass from his clothes and hair. “What are you doing?” Gordon asks, sounding faintly irritated at discovering Tony shirtless and struggling to remove his shoes in the middle of the living room.

“Glass,” Tony says, before realising that he’s shirtless. Shirtless and alone with Gordon. He blushes a little. _This wouldn’t bother you with anyone else_ , he tells himself, annoyed. _Grow up._

“Sit down,” Gordon commands. Tony does as he’s told. “Let me see your hand.”

“It’s fine,” he says, showing Gordon his palm. Gordon inspects it with a scowl.        

“It’s not that fine,” he mutters grimly. “You’re lucky it doesn’t need stitches.”

“And you can recognise a wound that doesn’t need stitches– how, exactly?” asks Tony, amused, trying to ignore the fact that Gordon has taken his hand in his. “Your very tough upbringing in Fife? Among the Sharks and the Jets?”

Gordon laughs at that– a small, soft sound that Tony forgot he could make.

“Is that your idea of gang violence? _West Side Story_?”         

Tony smiles at him, utterly charmed.        

“It gets worse, actually. I’ve never even seen _West Side Story_.”

“Are you sure?" Gordon asks. "I’d have assumed you could do  _I Feel Pretty_ off by heart.” He looks more at ease than Tony's seen him in months; he's beginning to suspect that Gordon's missed this, too, and opens his mouth to reply, but Gordon touches his palm, applying the antibacterial cream, and Tony gets lost in the motion instead.       

“That should do it,” Gordon announces, winding the bandage carefully around his hand. Tony nods.          

“You didn’t have to do this,” he says, in lieu of something stupid like _thank you_ or _I love you_.

“You should take better care of yourself.” It’s absurd to hear this from _Gordon_ of all people, Gordon who needs to be taken care of constantly, Gordon who has no idea of how much of Tony’s time is dedicated to keeping him safe. “This is the second time in less than two years I’ve had to carry you to my car.”

“When was the first time?”

“When you had pneumonia.”          

Tony utters a small noise of derision.         

“That was nothing. That was a fuss over nothing.”

“You were _hospitalised._ ”

“Oh, for five minutes!”

“For five _days,_ Tony, and…” Gordon trails off, sighing. “It doesn’t matter. Stop being so reckless.”

“I’m hardly reckless,” Tony protests. Gordon frowns, but he doesn’t look upset. He likes this. This is how they should be all the time.

“Change the bandage once a day,” Gordon tells him, one hand in his pocket for his car keys. Tony can’t let him leave, not now, with Gordon so close to him and Tony so close to making this right.

“Hey. Stay. For... tea.” Gordon looks confused, but not suspicious.          

“Why?”

“So we can talk.” Tony looks up at him pleadingly. “I miss you.”

“We’re not friends, Tony,” Gordon says. His voice is cold, and any other day it might have stopped him. Today, perhaps because Tony's still not completely sober, perhaps because the relaunch was a _success_ and he can do anything at all– perhaps just bloody-minded impatience– he’s only completely calm.

“Ok,” he says, matter-of-factly. He pushes his chair back, stands up and presses a hand to the back of Gordon’s neck. “So we'll be something else.”

He kisses Gordon, confident and careful, knowing that if he gets this, if he gets Gordon to do this, it’ll be fine. If he gets this right, he gets everything: Gordon, the shop, admiration and God knows what else. Fiona Apple finishes _Shadowboxer_ and begins singing _Criminal_ , and Tony smiles; everyone is helping him today and everything has been leading up to this.        

“Tony,” Gordon says abruptly, pulling back. “What are you doing?”

“Can't you tell?” he asks flippantly, watching in satisfaction as Gordon struggles not to laugh.          

Gordon, being Gordon, hesitates, but Tony knows him. Besides, Gordon has an arm around Tony’s waist, and a hand on his hip; it's not difficult to work out what he wants, so Tony takes his hand and pulls him toward his bedroom, Gordon following him as though dazed. 

“We have to,” Tony says, pushing Gordon back onto the bed. It’s not, he knows, simply that he’s drunk or that he got hurt or the events of tonight; it’s because Gordon obsesses him and completes him, and because he wants Gordon obsessively and completely. “I want you,” he says instead, because that's true as well.

Gordon doesn’t reply, but when Tony climbs into his lap and kisses him again, needy and deep, his hands go to Tony's hips, shifting him until Tony is just where he wants. His fingers press into Tony’s skin hard enough to hurt; Tony is pleased to discover he just finds this attractive. “I want you,” he says again, slightly hushed, kissing along his jawline. “It’s all I think about.” He's already unbuttoning Gordon’s shirt, clumsy and fast; he hears Gordon’s breath hitch, and smiles, and moves to kiss him again. They find a rhythm of kisses and movement, like a well-written piece of music, almost effortlessly.

“Do you have…” Gordon breaks their kiss to stare at him. He's flushed; it is, frankly, absolutely endearing. “Things?”

“What, lube and a condom?” Tony asks as innocently as he can manage whilst simultaneously pulling Gordon’s shirt off. “Yes, but if you’re inexperienced we can just…”

“Inexperienced?” Gordon repeats. For a moment, Tony thinks Gordon is going to kiss him again, but then Tony is on his stomach, and Gordon hold Tony’s hands in place, pinning them together against the bedsheets. Tony’s laughter is part frustration and part joy at the realisation that he very much likes this side of Gordon, too.

“Bedside table,” Tony mumbles into the pillow, missing the contact and the kisses.

Gordon mouths at the back of his neck, slowly at first, then hard and with _teeth,_ making Tony see stars with need.          

“Gordon,” he moans. “Don’t be petty.”

Gordon bites his neck again and Tony feels his breath against his ear.

“Patience,” he growls, and Tony grinds against the sheets, wondering gleefully whether Gordon will make him beg for it.         

He can still hear Fiona Apple singing in the living room.

 _What I need is a good_ _defence_

_'Cause I'm feeling like a criminal_

 

* * *

 

Waking up– alone, disappointingly– he finds he doesn’t have a headache, which is almost certainly nothing short of a miracle. He goes to the mirror with some trepidation and examines the purple bruises down his neck and marks on his waist; when he touches them, he is delighted to find they hurt. They, at least, serve as proof he hadn’t simply hallucinated the previous evening.

The flat’s empty, but there’s a mug in the sink and a note on the side, in Gordon’s huge, terrible handwriting.

 _Change it once a day_.

He’d feel a little disappointed at the absence, were he not too smug about last night to care. Besides, he could’ve expected this. He knows Gordon.

He texts Peter:

_Did everything go ok?_

_Morning, dear._ _Everything was fine. Told people you were busy dealing with some troublemakers. Not many noticed, though._

_Alastair worked his magic, then?_

_Of course._ He’s about to put his phone away, before Peter sends another: _Did Gordon work his?_

Tony rubs the purple smudges on his neck with considerable satisfaction.          

 _You could say that._

He makes himself coffee and changes the bandage.

Leaving his flat for work, he catches himself humming  _Son of a Preacher Man_ , and laughs out loud.

 

* * *

 

Margaret, clearing up the remnants of the party, actually gasps when he walks in.

“Good Lord,” she says, examining him closely. “He really laid into you, didn’t he?”

“Er– sorry?” he asks, blushing a little. He’d hoped last night's activities wouldn’t be quite _that_ obvious.

“Mac,” she tuts, eyeing his bruises with some sympathy. “Peter said the fight was fairly minor, but look at you! You’re black and blue.”

“Oh!” he catches up. “Oh, yeah. The fight. Definitely. Yeah.”        

She shakes her head, looking rather worried. He feels faintly guilty for lying to her, but he can’t afford to do anything that might upset Gordon. She’ll be the first to know, he decides, once he’s persuaded Gordon of the absolute idiocy of leaving a potentially excellent relationship as a one-night stand.      

“I’m so sorry, Tony. I thought he was just talk. I'm such a moron... we should’ve done something.”   

Tony shrugs, smiling awkwardly.

“Well,” he says, as modestly as he can contrive, “anything for the shop.”

He wonders if he should help her clean. Then he remembers the empty flat.        

“Is Gordon–?”

“Already in the office,” she says, and then adds, knowingly, “I think he’s a bit worse for wear. He wouldn’t even _look_ at me this morning. Robin’s the same way. You’d think the Scots would handle their drink better, wouldn’t you?”         

Tony’s smiles broadens, and he goes to see Gordon.          

The door is slightly ajar– they never did fix the doorknob– so Tony walks in without knocking. Gordon glances up, annoyance turning instantly to horror and a kind of fear, and continues bashing away at the laptop. He can’t stop his ears turning red, though; Tony wants to laugh at that, but bites his lip and restrains himself.

“Hey,” he says softly, leaning on the desk next to Gordon, who shifts away slightly.

“How’s your hand?” Gordon asks, staring blankly at the spreadsheet in front of him.

“Good,” Tony assures him, holding it out.

Despite Gordon’s insistence on clean bandages, he doesn’t spare it more than a cursory glance.

“Good.”

They sit in silence for several long seconds, before Gordon coughs uncomfortably. “I should get back to work–”

“You can do that later,” Tony says. “Gordon–”        

Gordon doesn’t look away from the screen, still pretending to examine the numbers. Tony puts a hand under Gordon’s chin, and gently tilts his head up to face him.     

“I know you don’t find me that bad-looking, Gordon,” he says, almost as gentle as he is smug. Gordon is flushing badly, but he can’t look away now he’s been challenged.

“I have to work,” he repeats, but his voice betrays him.

“Take a break. Your boss is a bastard, anyway,” Tony replies, and Gordon laughs, surprised. “Hm?”

Gordon hesitates. Gordon always hesitates.

“I know it’s... a lot,” Tony admits, slowly. “For y– for us. And that you’re probably writing a fifty-page list of reasons for not getting involved with me.” Gordon coughs and shifts the laptop slightly over the single sheet of paper on the desk. Tony smiles. “I think we should be together anyway.”

“Tony.” Gordon says, pushing his chair back, away from him.

“Gordon,” Tony says, impatient, “it just makes _sense_.” It’s so _obvious_. “It’s when we're at our best.”

Gordon stares at him. His eyes seem unusually dark. Tony admires them for a moment.     

“I still hate you,” Gordon says. “Sometimes.”

It’s true, of course, and Tony knows it’s true, but he came for Gordon, not his forgiveness.

“That,” Tony replies lightly, “is far more common in relationships than you appear to believe.” He straightens up and takes a step towards Gordon, who inhales sharply.         

“We won’t be good for each other. It will confuse things.”

“We’re perfect together. We’d be great.”

“The shop.”

“What’s good for us is good for the shop,” Tony says, with the absolute confidence of a maniac, and stoops a little to kiss him again; Gordon tilts his face up to meet him, mouth slightly parted. Tony knows that, as long as he can make it work, this will be the second most important yes the universe has given him, 

“I missed you,” he says, kissing Gordon’s forehead, “so much. I miss who I am with you.” He sighs. “You know me.”          

He kisses his mouth this time, and Gordon kisses back, eyes closed, because Tony knows him, knows Gordon's missed him, and knows Gordon wants him too.          

“Right,” Gordon says, and he sighs as though defeated. “We could try.”          

Tony smiles, eyes twinkling.

“Good, because I was running low on arguments. My next one was going to be that it’ll _really_ annoy Robin.”

Gordon smiles and shakes his head with undisguised fondness, so Tony kisses him again, deeper and adoring.

 

* * *

 

They go to the bank later that week, Tony smiling smugly at their branch manager, who meets his eyes with a certain apprehension.

“So you see,” Tony concludes, after a rapid-fire summary of changed ownership and expanding profit margins, and maybe just one or two passing references to how they're partners in _both_  senses of the word, “we have the money. And Gordon wants to clear the higher-interest loans completely, as soon as possible.”

Moira looks suspicious.

“That’s a lot of money you’re offering to pay in a very short space of time, Mr. Blair, and given your recent history–”

“Moira,” Tony repeats, glowing with confidence. “ _Gordon_ says we should.”

She glances over at Gordon, examining for herself this ultimate financial authority, sulking a little in his chair and evading Tony's attempts to take his hand.

She doesn’t look very impressed.

“You’re completely sure, then?” she asks him.

Gordon sighs and launches into a lengthy explanation of rescheduled timeframes, lump sum overpayment figures, administration fees, interest rates and prudence. Tony isn’t following it _exactly_ , but he has the gist and he firmly believes that the details take care of themselves when the general concept is sound.

“Like I said, Moira,” Tony adds when he’s sure Gordon’s finished. “Gordon’s got it.”

He manages to find Gordon’s hand this time. Gordon doesn’t look happy about it, but he doesn’t let go, either. Moira sighs and turns to her computer, defeated.

 

* * *

 

In the parking lot, Gordon’s hand manages to escape Tony’s fingers.

“We agreed no PDA. That was part of the deal,” he grumbles, searching for his car keys.

“We agreed no kissing,” Tony replies, leaning lazily against Gordon’s car door.

Gordon glares at him.

“ _Loopholes_ ,” he mutters, shaking his head. “I should have fucking known.”

Tony shrugs elegantly.

“I am a lawyer, you know.”

“Fuck off, Tony,” Gordon says. There’s no malice, though, just irritation. "Be serious."

“We are serious,” Tony replies, then smiles thoughtfully. “You know another loophole? We can kiss in the car.”

Gordon doesn’t have an answer to that, but he fumbles the keys slightly in a way makes Tony’s smile broaden in anticipation.

 

* * *

 

On Friday night they’re half-snuggling on the sofa (Tony has an arm around Gordon but Gordon won’t quite lean against him. He’ll get tired eventually, though. The man gets up at _five_ ), and Tony has convinced Gordon to watch _Battlestar Galactica_ instead of three hundred documentaries about a struggling musicians known only to five people in 1951. He thinks they’re making excellent progress; Gordon’s only paused it to talk about the shop three times in the last hour.

“Roslin and Adama,” Tony says out loud, touching Gordon’s hair absently. “That’s how we would be. If we were in space.”

Gordon shifts on the sofa next to him, looking confused, as Tony pushes back his t-shirt sleeve to admire the freckles on his shoulder.

“Tony, why would we be in space? That sounds terrible. And what are you–?” Tony kisses his shoulder, tenderly, and smiles when he notices Gordon getting goosebumps.

“Why does it sound terrible, dear?” he asks meekly, kissing the freckles again.

“The President is an authoritarian with a messiah complex,” Gordon mumbles, brow furrowed, trying not to squirm under Tony’s mouth.

“She’s just pragmatic, Gordon! And personally I think the messianic stuff is quite charming,” Tony says, giving Gordon’s shoulder a small bite and exulting at the shiver he gets in response.

“And he’s a sad little military man, disrupting her government for no reason other than his own emotional problems,” Gordon continues, sounding badly out of breath.

“Romance,” Tony says dismissively, between kissing Gordon’s collarbone and his neck.

“Not _healthy_ romance,” he objects, but when Tony kisses him quiet he acquiesces and pulls him close.

Tony leans into him as he deepens the kiss until they’re almost horizontal. He feels less in control on top of Gordon than he ever has under anybody else; Gordon fumbles with Tony’s belt at first, but gets distracted kissing his stomach, and Tony has wriggled halfway out of his jeans before it occurs to Gordon to remove them.

“Tony,” he moans. Tony almost laughs; he's wanted to hear Gordon say his name like that for such a ridiculously long time it hardly seems real. “ _Tony_ ,” Gordon repeats, managing to sound a little sharper as he attempts to establish some distance, “the shop.”

“It’s going well, isn’t it?” Tony says. It’s a little conceited, but it _is_ going well, and Gordon is getting hard against his leg, so he thinks he deserves to feel a little conceited. He tries to resume the business of kissing Gordon, but is pulled back by Gordon's hand in his hair. Tony winces.

“Robin’s idea,” Gordon says, voice gravelly, “to get his friend at that European vinyl festival to bring back some records–”

“I told him it was daft and he couldn’t do it,”  Tony replies dutifully.

“It’s actually a good idea,” Gordon corrects him. “But I didn’t want it done through any of his people.” 

Tony’s smile is unbearably conceited now, he’s sure.

“Mr. Brown,” he murmurs in his best faux-scandalised voice, “are you trying to use _sex_ to get your way in the workplace?”

Gordon frowns. His grip on Tony’s hair tightens a little.

“I'm trying to have a conversation about the future of the shop. _You_ are trying to get sex, because that’s all that’s ever– that's all that you ever–"

“Ah, that does sound more like us,” Tony admits ruefully, trying to lower his head again.

“I’m serious, Tony. Can I ask Nicolas–?”

“Anything for my Admiral,” Tony purrs, and is rewarded when Gordon lets go of his hair.

“Before you ask,” Gordon warns him, “there is absolutely _no_ possibility of getting me to call you President.”

Tony just kisses him again.

 

* * *

 

Tony sings _Son of a Preacher Man_ to Gordon sometimes, early in the morning, stealing sips from the coffee Tony makes for him. Gordon never finds it as funny as he should.

Margaret is the first to know; when they tell her, she looks confused, but congratulates them sincerely enough. They tell Robin next, who is utterly appalled; Harriet just giggles. Tony hears them laying bets on how long until they break up. None of them give it more than three months.

But they’re still together at Christmas.

The conglomerate continues to make all their lives difficult, although not nearly as difficult as they all make each other’s, and Tony knows like he knows his own name that they won’t lay a finger on the shop as long as he owns it.

The shop’s own awkward squad still drop by for a few good old-fashioned protests, complete with loud complaints from Mac about how he ‘was almost killed by the establishment’. Tony  points out they aren’t as menacing as they think they are; they never point out Tony is not as good as he thinks he is. It's an uneasy coexistence, but it seems to work.

The kids loathe Tony more than ever, which is satisfying. Of course, hearing himself diagnosed as the root of every ill in Gordon’s life five times a day is annoying, but hearing Gordon tell Ed that Bastille ‘really aren’t all that bad’ is _beautiful_.

Peter and Philip were both amused, he suspects, by how long it took them to finally get together. Gordon and Peter continue to hate one another, mostly. They also continue to communicate largely in codes and glances Tony never learns to read, so Tony continues to occasionally get jealous and, once or twice, to sack Peter. 

Tony is wrong; not everything is fixed by having Gordon. Red’s still Red’s, brilliant and ridiculous and impossible as Gordon himself. Tony keeps busy trying to get them to be as they should be, and there's still resistance in so many different ways that he still finds himself wondering if he shouldn’t just forget all about it.

He never does.

Red’s is a strange little world, but it is his.


End file.
